So Lost, So Helpless
by TMara
Summary: The final lair plays out slightly differently and Christine realizes whom she really loves. But her happiness seems short-lived and problems abound.
1. Realization

There you go - a teaser for my next story to wet your appetite. I hope you will enjoy it just as much as my previous ones and I am looking forward to your reviews...

This chapter is dedicated to my dear fellow author and reviewer You Are Love, who once asked me in a PM if E & C might do something that they usually only do at the end of my stories somewhere around the middle of "When We've Said Goodbye". Well... it's not gonna happen in that story, but I am fairly certain she was referring to something they do in this chapter.

Oh, and I still don't own anything or anybody... but then, neither do you! (sticks out tongue)

Chapter 1 - Realization

„You try my patience, make your choice!"

Christine shuddered. She looked at the two men in front of her: her childhood friend and fiancé Raoul was standing in the subterranean lake, tied to the portcullis, a noose around his neck, gasping for breath, his face already turning red, while the other one, the Phantom – no, she corrected herself, her Angel – was holding a rope in his hand, ready to tighten the noose around Raoul's neck, to end her fiancé's life.

Christine looked from one man to the other. Both were silently pleading with her, trying to force her decision, but somehow Christine had a feeling that she could not let either of them influence her. This was too important, this was the choice she had to make on her own, because whichever way she chose, she would be the one to live with the consequences. But was there really a choice?

Christine looked at the one that had been her angel for so many years, her confidant, her best friend, and her heart went out to him. What had happened to her kind, supportive, sensitive guardian, who understood music like no other and had always been there for her? What had turned him into this raving lunatic that threatened to kill another human being? She swallowed hard. "This is my fault," she suddenly realized. "He has been abused and shunned by society all his life because of his face, but when he started to befriend me, he hoped that I would be different, that since I already knew him as a person, I would be able to accept him, once he revealed himself to me. He has done so much for me and I… I have failed him so miserably."

She smiled. She knew what she had to do. There really was only one viable option for her, one choice, which would allow her to save both these men that were – or had at one point been – dear to her. She would save Raoul's life and her angel's soul, by preventing him from killing yet again. Resolutely she stepped into the lake and walked up to her former angel – her fallen angel, she corrected herself – smiling at him encouragingly. "Pitiful creature of darkness," she whispered, "what kind of life have you known? God give me courage to show you, you are not alone!"

"Yes," she nodded at him, "my answer is yes. I will stay with you." She looked into his eyes to make him understand that she was serious about it. She had finally made her choice. She knew that she owed it to him. He had been there for her when she had been alone after her father's death and had needed somebody to take care of her. Now she would be there for him, for now he needed her.

Her angel stared at her, and Christine blushed. His eyes… oh God, his eyes! She had never before noticed how beautiful they were, how expressive. There were so many emotions reflected in those orbs gazing at her. Incredulity, surprise, doubt… and at the very bottom of them… was that hope?

"He has his doubts about the sincerity of my promise," she thought. "I need to convince him." That's when his lips caught her eye. Bloated, yes, but also strangely appealing. Would it feel different from kissing Raoul, she wondered, or would it be the same? It did not really matter. She had just promised to stay with him, this was their engagement, and to show her poor, unloved angel that she truly meant it, she would seal it with a kiss.

Christine's hand reached for the deformed man's face, pulling it down, so that she could press her lips to his. For a split-second nothing happened. Her angel seemed frozen in shock at what she did, then his lips began to move against hers and something within Christine stirred. It felt as if she had a thousand butterflies in her stomach, humming and buzzing and batting their tiny wings. This was nothing like the kisses she had shared with Raoul, this was different, but in a good way.

Christine broke away for air and smiled at her angel. The look of incredulous wonder on his face warmed her heart. He had enjoyed their kiss as well. Encouraged by his obvious delight, she pulled him closer to her and kissed him again, her left hand caressing his deformed cheek. To her utter surprise the skin there was soft and pleasing to her touch and Christine decided that she could get used to kissing and holding her angel like that.

Finally he broke away from her, his expressive eyes full of emotions: love, incredible tenderness, awe, hope… and still some doubt. "Come," he finally said glumly, grasped her hand and pulled her with him. Christine followed him out of the lake and into his lair, till he stopped in front of the huge bird-shaped bed.

"Prove it," he told her, his eyes ablaze. "Be mine."

Christine's eyes widened. Surely he did not ask her to…? "What do you mean?" she asked nervously. "I promised to stay with you…" She did not dare look at the bed. He could not possibly expect her to get into this bed with him now and do certain unspeakable things that married couples had to do if they wanted children. She only had a vague idea what exactly that entailed, but as far as she knew, it involved nudity and the woman allowing the man to stick a certain part of his anatomy into her most private parts. Of course, when she had accepted Raoul's proposal, she had known that sooner or later she would have to submit to this "act", but she had hoped that Raoul would not push her when she did not feel ready for this yet. And now her angel expected her to do this very act with him, when they were not even properly married?

"I knew it." The incredible sadness of her angel's voice interrupted Christine's thoughts. "It was a lie. You do not want to go as far as that. A kiss the Vicomte may forgive, but that… he would not want a used woman…" His insane laughter echoed through the subterranean cavern. "A ploy," he sneered, "a subterfuge, to make me release the Vicomte and then you'd wait for a chance to run away, to leave me again…"

Christine trembled. She was letting him down again. And to be honest, she could not blame him for not trusting her. After how she had treated him ever since he had revealed himself to her after her debut performance in "Hannibal", it really would be utterly stupid of him to believe one single word she said.

"It's not what you think, Angel," Christine finally whispered shyly. "It's not that I don't want to be yours, it's just… I have never done this." She waved her hand towards the bed, blushing deeply. "I am nervous," she admitted.

Her obvious distress seemed to somewhat calm him, but his voice still oozed despair and hopelessness, when he spoke again. "Of course, if the handsome Vicomte asked you, you might be more inclined to accommodate his wishes," he accused her.

Christine closed her eyes. What could she say or do to make him understand that her reluctance had nothing to do with him, but with the act itself he was asking her to perform? Nothing, she realized. Nothing would convince him. His self-doubt and the conviction that nobody would ever love him, care for him in any way, shape or form were so deeply ingrained in his psyche, that nothing would convince him otherwise.

Christine summoned all her courage. She had promised to stay with him, be his wife. Sooner or later they would therefore do this anyway. Did it really matter when? Would it be less awkward three weeks from now?

"Yes," she finally whispered, trembling with fear of what she was agreeing to. "Let's do it. Make me yours."

Her angel looked at her, as if she had suddenly grown a second head. "Are you sure?" he asked hesitantly. His eyes bright with love for her and full of hope that maybe she would learn one day to feel the same way about him.

Christine smiled. Whatever unpleasantness and awkwardness the next hour would bring, that look of cautious joy and love on his face was worth it. He looked younger, relaxed, and she felt all warm and fuzzy inside, knowing that she had caused his contentment.

"I am sure," she replied, wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head on his broad chest. She could feel his heartbeat, and when his hands came up to hold her in a tight embrace, Christine's nervousness was gone. She suddenly knew without any doubt that he would not hurt her, that he would make the experience as little embarrassing and awkward for her as possible, and all of a sudden she was glad it was him she was going to do this with, and not Raoul.

Once her angel's lips claimed hers in the most passionate kiss she had ever experienced, all thoughts of embarrassment and awkwardness dissipated, as she felt a tingling desire deep down in her belly, a need that only her angel could fulfill. She hungrily returned his kiss, submitted to his caresses and caressed him back. They avidly explored each other's bodies, shedding more and more items of clothing while doing so, until their need for each other was finally fulfilled in a joyous coupling of their bodies.

Xxxx

Afterwards, Christine lay in her angel's arms, smiling at him, gently caressing his deformed cheek. She did not care that they were both still naked. With him she did not feel shy. "This was marvelous," she told him, kissing the tip of his nose. "I had no idea it could be like this."

Her angel gently brushed a few chocolate brown curls out of her face and tucked them behind her ear. "And do you not regret having given yourself to me? Would you not rather have wanted to do this with your Vicomte?" he asked softly. His madness was gone, he was much calmer and relaxed now, and his deformed face was glowing with love and tenderness for her.

Christine shook her head. "No," she said. "I am glad it was you. With Raoul it would not have been the same." Her voice was strong and serious. She meant every word she said. Never in a thousand years would she have been able to abandon herself so fully, to give herself so freely, if the man in bed with her had been Raoul. Because … because she did not love Raoul. Not in that way, at least. She beamed as realization hit her. "Because I love _you_," she admitted shyly, "not him."

"You love me?" he asked incredulously. "Me the faceless monster? How can that be? Nobody has ever loved me."

Christine snuggled up to him, pressing herself even closer to his lean body. "Yes, it is true," she said solemnly. "I did not know myself until…." She blushed. "When you kissed me," she finally decided. "When I kissed you, I already noticed that it was different from kissing Raoul, somehow more meaningful, but when I agreed to this and you kissed me, it hit me, that I had misunderstood my own heart, that it was you I truly wanted. I do love you, and I think I have always loved you. My feelings for you are so … different from those I have for Raoul, so much deeper and stronger. Oh Angel," she sighed, smiling happily at him.

"Erik," he corrected her, barely able to speak, since he was moved to tears by her confession. "My name is Erik."

"Erik." Christine liked it. It was a good, strong name, not too common in France, but very popular in her own home country of Sweden. "I love you, Erik."

Erik's face lit up at those words. He had long ago given up all hope of ever hearing these words from anybody, let alone his beloved Christine. The sound of his own name being pronounced by her sweet lips was intoxicating. He sat up and reached under the pillow on his side of the bed, pulling forth a tiny box. He opened it, took out a plain gold band with a single diamond and slipped it on Christine's finger.

"We need to get married as soon as possible," he told her, "after what we just did…." He looked at her apologetically. "I should never have asked this of you before we were married."

Christine smiled. She liked the tasteful, unassuming ring he had just given her. "I would love to be your wife, Erik," she said beaming. "And the ring you chose for me is stunning." She gave him a quick peck on the cheek, before she added, "and don't feel bad because of… this. Yes, I always thought I would wait until after my wedding and only do this with my husband, but I understand why you needed this proof of my sincerity, and I needed to show you that … that your face doesn't matter. We both needed this experience in order to rebuild our trust that I had destroyed so frivolously. And since we are getting married anyway…"

Their lips met again and for a few moments they forgot everything other than their love and newfound happiness. Then, all of a sudden, Erik pulled away from Christine and sat up straight.

"Quick," he said, "get dressed. We need to leave."

Christine stared at him uncomprehendingly. "What is the matter, Erik?" she asked, trying to pull him back to her side.

"A mob is approaching," Erik explained. Thanks to his superior hearing he had already perceived the sounds of the approaching crowd. "We are no longer safe here."

He picked up Christine's discarded clothes and shoved them into her hands, then stepped into his own trousers. Christine now heard faint noise coming from a distance as well. She panicked. The people approaching sounded anything but friendly. She quickly put on her clothes, then followed Erik to the shore of the lake.

"You go with him," Erik said, pointing at Raoul, who was still tied to the portcullis. "You will be safer that way. You know Mme. Giry's little house in the suburbs? Good. Go there. She will let you stay till I can come for you, my love. It may not be safe for me to follow you there tonight, but tomorrow night at the latest, I will meet you there. Then we can go away together, get married and start a new life somewhere else."

Christine objected. She did not want to leave Erik, to let him face the mob alone, and she was not prepared to go with Raoul now that she knew she did not love him the way she loved Erik. "Please, Erik, let me go with you," she begged, but he was adamant. For her own safety she had to go with the Vicomte.

"I promise I will be careful," Erik said, kissing her once more. "Since now my life does not belong to me anymore, but to my beautiful bride, to whom I intend to return safe and sound."

Christine smiled bravely. The angry sound of the approaching mob scared her and she was not sure if Raoul would be able to keep her safe. She would feel much safer in Erik's presence, but she also understood that the Phantom was probably their main target, and that she would slow Erik down with that stupid wedding dress she was wearing. For his sake she would go with Raoul, so that she would not be a hindrance to his escape.

In the meantime, Erik had cut Raoul lose and instructed him, what to do. "Take her," he said, "Forget me, forget all of this." And then he added, "take the boat, swear to me never to tell the secret you know of the angel in hell. Go now," he shouted, shoving Christine towards Raoul. "Go now and leave me!"

Raoul hugged Christine. "Little Lotte," he sighed. But Christine pushed him away, leading the way to the boat. "Quick," she told him. "We need to get away, or the mob…." Tears began streaming down her face. She was worried sick about Erik and prayed that he would be safe and meet her at Mme. Giry's home soon.

At the obvious display of Christine's fear, Raoul's protectiveness took over. "Don't worry, Little Lotte," he promised. "You are safe now. Nobody will harm you now, not the mob, not this…" He glared towards the lair, where Erik was smashing a huge mirror, behind which seemed to be a secret passageway.

Raoul frowned. A very disconcerting thought troubled him. What if…? Deftly poling the boat towards what he thought was the nearest exit, he watched Christine, who had turned around and was looking back to the murderer's lair. "He did not…," Raoul began uncertainly. This was a delicate subject and he was not quite sure how to tackle it. "The two of you were gone so long," he began again, his voice clouded with concern. "What happened? I hope he did not … force you? For, if he hurt you in any way, Little Lotte, I swear I'll make him pay."

Christine's cheeks turned red with anger. How could Raoul talk to her like that? Hadn't he heard her promise that she would stay with Erik as his wife and seen her kiss him? Did he not understand that this meant she was engaged to Erik now and that therefore whatever happened between her and Erik was none of his concern? And how could he assume Erik would ever physically force himself on her, or hurt her? "Yes, it's true," she thought, "he did not leave me much of a choice, but if I had said no, he would never have forced me. And turn it as I may, I gave myself freely."

She gave Raoul a scolding look. "Of course not," she said indignantly. "He would never hurt me. He gave me this ring, though," she added, trying to appease her childhood friend, "and he promised that we would get married soon."

Raoul stared at her. "Good thing then that the approaching mob changed his mind," he sneered. "Or else he might indeed have dragged you in front of the altar and forced you to marry him."

Christine smiled. "Nothing has changed his mind," she said dreamily. "Nor mine, for that matter. We are still going to get married. He just sent me with you, because he thought I would be less of a target for the mob that way. I am sorry, Raoul, that I had to break our engagement like that, without really telling you, and get into a new one so quickly, but I know now that it is him I love, and I am glad I found out before marrying you…"


	2. Confession

So, there it is, the long awaited second chapter of my new story. Thank you all for your reviews! I would love to reply to each of them individually, but that would probably mean you have to wait even longer for each chapter, especially since my previous story is not finished yet either. So I just want to thank all of you for reading, and in particular those of you that have already put this story on alert, added it to your favorites or written one of those lovely reviews.

My very cherished, loyal readers, that are also waiting for an update of "When We've Said Goodbye", please bear with me. I will tr to get this up either tomorrow or Tuesday. It definitely will be next. And if you are a new reader of my stories, you might also want to check out that other story, while waiting for the next update of this one.

I still don't own anything even remotely connected with POTO, unless you count stuff like CDs or DVDs and such. Nothing changed about that. Sigh!

Chapter 2 – Confession

Raoul stared at Christine. What had gotten into his – _his_, not that monster's – fiancée? How could she just sit there and tell him calmly that she was planning to marry that …. thing? Had she lost her mind?

"He must have drugged her," Raoul thought, "or hypnotized her, brainwashed her one way or another. Thank God for that mob! They arrived just in time. Hopefully they will finish him off. The effect of whatever he has used on her should wear off in a few days, and if he is not around anymore to manipulate her again, she will hopefully return to her senses. All I have to do is wait…."

For the remainder of their journey across the subterranean lake neither Christine nor Raoul spoke. They were both lost in their own thoughts, Christine secretly praying that Erik would be safe and Raoul pondering how he could make her submit to a doctor checking if she was still a virgin.

Once they emerged from the cellars of the burning Opéra Populaire, Raoul lead Christine to his carriage and tried to usher her into it. Christine gave him a stern look. "I am not coming with you," she stated calmly. "Even if we were still engaged, it would not be appropriate."

Raoul was about to lose his patience. How could she deny being engaged to him? She was his, she had agreed to marry him, and after all he had done for her, all he had gone through for her sake, she'd better keep that promise. He realized, though, that she was in no condition to see reason, drugged or hypnotized as she obviously was.

"Where do you want to go then?" he asked curtly, barely containing his anger and frustration. "Surely you've noticed that your previous home has gone up in flames thanks to that faceless devil of yours."

Christine glared at Raoul. "Everybody has the right to defend themselves when ambushed or otherwise threatened," she said tartly. "You cannot really blame him for doing just that. As to your question, I am going to stay with Mme. Giry."

Raoul calmed down a bit. There was nothing objectionable about Christine's wish to stay with the ballet mistress, whom Raoul considered an ally. On the contrary, maybe that woman would be able to talk some sense into her. He therefore nodded his agreement. "Give me the address, I'll drop you off there on my way home," he relented.

Christine hesitated for a moment. Could she trust Raoul? She was well aware of his unwillingness to accept that she had ended their engagement. Was his offer just a trick to get her into his carriage? She finally decided that she had to risk it. She really had no other option. She had no money with her, so could not hail a carriage herself, and walking all the way to the suburbs where Mme. Giry owned a little house with a garden was out of the question. It would take her over an hour to get there, and the streets were not safe at this time of the night, not to mention the fact that she was not dressed for the chilly outside temperatures. She would never make it to the Giry-home without his help.

"It would be very kind of you to take me to Mme. Giry," Christine therefore agreed, naming the street where the Girys' house was located. Raoul informed the coachman of the address, then helped Christine into the carriage.

Xxxx

Mme. Giry was already home, when they arrived at their destination. She was relieved to see Christine unharmed, but immediately noticed that the young woman, who was now wearing a wedding dress instead of the Aminta-costume she had last seen her in, was extremely tense and more formal with the Vicomte than usual. Something must have happened that had put a strain on their relationship.

"Thank you very much, Vicomte," she therefore cut his visit short, "for bringing Christine to me. As you can see, she is freezing. She needs to get out of those damp clothes…"

Raoul understood the hint. He had hoped that he might be able to talk to Mme. Giry, ask her to make Christine see reason, but the resolute way of the ballet mistress made it clear that she would not be available for such a conversation tonight, and despite his disappointment he had to admit that Mme. Giry was right. Christine needed her attention now. The skirts of her dress were as soaked as his own clothes and the night air was chilly. The sooner they both got out of their wet garments, the better.

"I will come back tomorrow and check on Christine," he therefore announced somewhat pompously, turned on his heels and walked out of the front door.

Mme. Giry watched him climb back into his carriage. Once she was satisfied that he was indeed gone, she turned to Christine. "Sh," she stopped the young woman, before the latter could utter one single word. "Not now. First things first. I'll draw you a hot bath. You need to get warm again. Once we have ensured that you won't come down with pneumonia, you can tell me everything."

Christine was too exhausted to argue and the thought of soaking in a hot bath made her realize just how cold she was – and how sore. A few minutes later, she was immersed in a hot bubble bath, relaxing her tense muscles. When she noticed the dried blood on her inner thigh, she blushed, remembering what had happened between her and her angel – Erik. She knew that people would judge her, consider her a lose woman, if they knew what she had done today. And yet, she could not bring herself to regret her earlier actions. It had felt so right – as if she had waited her whole life for Erik. True, what they had experienced together was supposed to happen only between married couples, but it was only a matter of days for them to officially tie the knot, and even though it had happened before their wedding, the man to whom she had given her virginity would still be her husband.

Xxxxx

Once Christine emerged from the bathroom, dressed in one of Meg's nightgowns, Mme. Giry had hot tea ready for her to warm her on the inside as well. Christine gratefully accepted, and after a few sips of the aromatic beverage, she looked up at the ballet mistress.

"I cannot marry Raoul," Christine announced. "And I have told him so. But I have a feeling that he is not going to accept my decision." She blushed deeply, moving her hand so that Mme. Giry could see her new engagement ring. "I am going to marry my angel," she whispered, smiling happily, "for he is my true love."

Mme. Giry gasped. She had not been expecting that development. Even though at one point she had hoped that Erik and Christine would become a couple, she had given up on that particular dream months ago. True, the way the two of them had acted on stage tonight during the performance of Erik's opera, had been incredibly tense and passionate, but that had been acting, had it not? At least on Christine's side?

"When did you … I mean, what made you realize…?" Mme. Giry was too surprised to form a coherent question.

Christine turned an even darker shade of pink. She was not going to tell Mme. Giry _everything_. The ballet mistress had strong moral principles and would certainly not approve of what Christine and Erik had done.

Christine hesitantly began to tell what had happened from the moment she and Erik escaped from the stage through a trapdoor, how her angel had not been himself, how he had forced her to put on the wedding dress, how Raoul had suddenly appeared and how Erik had made her choose. "There really only was one option for me," Christine explained, "and when I promised that I would stay with my angel and become his wife, I did it every bit as much for his sake as I did it to save Raoul. I knew that he needed me and that I owed him, and I knew that I could never live with myself if I abandoned him to despair, loneliness and his inner demons. I simply had to stay with him, for all our sakes. But when I told him so, he did not seem to believe me, and I cannot blame him for not trusting my words, so I…." Christine looked away. What would Mme. Giry think of her wanton behavior?

"I kissed him," Christine finally admitted.

Mme. Giry inhaled deeply. She normally did not approve of a woman kissing a man first, but she was willing to let the extraordinary circumstances pass for an excuse.

"It was nothing like what I had expected," Christine confessed. "It was so different from when Raoul kissed me, so more meaningful and deep, and – right."

"That's when you realized it was him you love?" Mme. Giry asked cautiously.

Christine smiled."I guess I fully understood only when he kissed me back," she admitted. "His previous madness dissipated once our lips touched, and he turned into my gentle, caring angel again, the one that I had always dreamed of meeting. I knew then and there that I had loved him forever, that my feelings for him had grown and deepened over the years and that what I feel for Raoul cannot compare. I do like Raoul, but when my angel kissed me, I realized that my love for Raoul is more like the way one would love a brother. Whereas my angel…." Christine paused at the memory of the sensations Erik's kiss had caused her, the desire, the _need_ to be one with him. "He gave me this ring," she continued, skipping what else they had done, "and proposed to me. I already knew then that I could not marry Raoul, because my heart belonged to my angel, so I accepted."

Christine's face was radiant with joy, her eyes full of love and tenderness for the man that had been her guide and guardian, her confidant, teacher, best friend, and now fiancé and lover. Mme. Giry smiled. Christine was wearing her feelings on her sleeve. There was no doubt in her anymore, that the young woman had truly learned to look beyond the mask and the disfigurement, to fully accept Erik for who and what he was and to love him for all the wonderful qualities he possessed and that all the horrors and sufferings of his violent past had not been able to suppress.

"He told me his name is Erik," Christine continued, then looked at Mme. Giry questioningly. "But you know that already, don't you? I never thought about it, but you must know him, too. You always delivered his messages, you gave me his rose after the performance… You always knew who my angel really was…."

Mme. Giry nodded. "Erik and I have known each other for a long time," she admitted. "We were both still children, when we first met. In a way you could probably say he is like my foster brother. And yes, I knew right from the start that it was him, when you began mentioning an Angel of Music. I knew he would never hurt you, that I could trust him with you. That's why I never interfered, why I allowed this charade and allowed him to teach you. I had a feeling that the two of you were good for each other, that you both needed this relationship, that you both were lonely souls and therefore understood each other, especially since you both shared this love for music…"

Christine smiled. "Erik and I do have a lot in common," she admitted, thinking back on endless hours of them talking, when she had still considered him her angel, of their passion for music and the wonderful harmony of their voices singing together. "Unlike me and Raoul. What binds me to Raoul is really just the memory of a few months passed together at the seaside when we were children, and maybe the fact that he knew my dear papa. Other than that…." Christine shook her head. "We do not even belong to the same social circle," she added. "There are so many things he does not understand, about the theater, our life there, our work. Sure, he does like music and the arts, and he is a patron, but he does not belong. He is not part of our world and despite our shared childhood I am not part of his. I would probably never fit there, and he has already suggested to me that I might have to give up singing once we'd be married."

Christine shook her head. What had she been thinking when she accepted Raoul's proposal? Had she not realized how little the two of them had in common? How different their worlds were? Had the fact that he had known her father, that he somehow was the last relic of that time before tragedy struck and she lost her dear papa, clouded her mind? Yes, she had been furious at her angel after the Bouquet-incident, terribly hurt that the one she trusted most would commit such a heinous crime, but was that reason enough to bind herself to Raoul?

"Anyway," Christine sighed with relief. "I finally know, where I belong and I am glad, I realized it in time. I would not have been happy as Raoul's wife, and I guess he would not have been either, once the honeymoon was over and he'd realized that his peers were looking down on the woman he had married. As Erik's wife, though…" Her smile deepened. "We will have music, and I will be able to continue singing. True, we will probably have to lead a rather reclusive life, but then, neither one of us cares for society with its huge, crowded events. We both prefer a quiet life, and we do love each other."

Mme. Giry smiled. She was so happy for her two protégés. One question remained, though. "Why did you go with the Vicomte then?" she asked. "Why didn't you stay with Erik?"

Christine shuddered. She suddenly remembered the danger her angel was in. "The mob," she mumbled. "There was a mob approaching. They were searching for the Phantom… my angel. It was horrible, their angry shouts, their screams of madness…. Erik sent me away with Raoul. He thought I would be less of a target that way…" Tears were forming in her dark eyes. "I wanted to stay with Erik. I did not want to abandon him in such a dangerous situation, but you have seen the dress I was wearing…"

Christine interrupted her narration. "The dress," she whispered. "My wedding dress. Is it ruined or do you think it can be repaired? I will need it when…" Her cheeks turned a lovely shade of pink at the thought of marrying Erik.

Mme. Giry patted Christine's shoulder. "Don't worry, the dress will be fine. It is mostly wet, that will dry. Fortunately the water of the subterranean lake around Erik's home is very clean, so there won't be any ugly stains. The hem might have been stepped upon and torn, but we can mend that tomorrow, once the dress has dried. It will be ready for your wedding."

Christine smiled and continued her story. "The dress would have been in the way. Wearing it I could not run. I would have slowed Erik down. I did not want to put him at risk, so I finally agreed to go with Raoul. But…." Her eyes were wide with fear now. "I am scared," she confessed. "I am so worried about Erik. The mob sounded so angry, and there were so many of them, so many voices, dozens of them, all against one single man. What if they find him? Oh Mme. Giry, what if they hurt my poor angel?"

Mme. Giry sighed. She had to admit that she was a bit concerned as well. She had to be strong for Christine, though. "Nobody knows those passageways like he does," she reminded Christine. "And unlike them, he is used to the darkness. He does not need a torch to find his way, so no flicker of light will give away his position. And I bet he will be extra careful, knowing that you are waiting for him, anxious for him to return to you, worried sick about him."

Christine smiled. "That's what he said," she admitted. "He promised to be careful and come back to me safe and sound. He will come here," she remembered, "but probably not tonight. He said tonight might not be safe, but tomorrow… He said he would come for me tomorrow night and we would get married and go away and start a new life together somewhere else."

Mme. Giry nodded. "In that case you'd better go to bed now," she suggested. "It is way past midnight and you have had an exhausting day. Even if Erik did come tonight you could not leave now, for once he has escaped the mob, he will need some rest as well. But since he told you it was more likely to expect him tomorrow, there is no need to stay up any longer and wait."

Christine felt like she would not be able to sleep, after all she had been through, not when there were so many new emotions and experiences her mind had to process, not when she was so worried about her beloved angel, her fiancé and husband-to-be Erik, but the moment her head hit the pillow, her exhausted body claimed its due and she dozed off, dreaming of her angel, of the sweetness of his kisses and of the utter bliss he had caused her when their bodies had been joined.

Mme. Giry remained in the parlor. It was not just Erik she was worried about, but her daughter as well. She had last seen Meg at the Opéra, before she herself had shown the Vicomte the way to Erik's lair. Where was Meg now? Why had she not come here yet, to this other home of theirs?

She was about to get really worried, when she finally heard the front door going. A moment later, Meg stood in the door to the parlor, filthy, but unharmed, in her hand a familiar white object.

"Oh my God," Mme. Giry gasped, as she recognized Erik's mask.


	3. Revelations

Thank you all for reading and reviewing, for adding to your favorites or putting this story on alert! I could not write my stories without all your support! I also thank you for your patience. I know it has been a while since my last update, but as some of you know, I am also still finishing my other story, "When We've Said Goodbye", and my choir had a rather busy schedule last week because of Easter. I'll try to update a bit more regularly from now on, honest, I promise! ;-)

Oh, and don't lose faith in me and abandon this story... you know I wouldn't really, right?

Anyway, here is the next chapter. I still don't own anything or anybody. Easter bunny was a disappointment in that regard, I must tell you. I had so hoped he'd bring me the rights to POTO. but no!

Chapter 3 - Revelations

Meg gave her mother a questioning look. "What is the matter, maman?" she asked curiously. "Why are you so upset?"

Mme. Giry tried to compose herself. Losing her nerves now would help nobody. "That mask," she remarked, making her voice sound as calm as possible. "How did you end up with it? And what about... him?"

"The Phantom?" Meg shook her head. It was not the first time her mother behaved as if... as if she actually cared for that monster who tyrannized the Opéra Populaire. "Why do you ask about him? I thought you might be more concerned about Christine."

"Christine is safe," Mme. Giry informed her daughter. "She is here, fast asleep in the guest room." She sighed. There was no point anymore in hiding her relationship with Erik from her own daughter. Not when Christine was planning to marry him. Meg would have to meet him sooner or later. It was therefore time to disclose some of her secrets to her daughter.

"Christine is here?" Meg sounded relieved. "When we didn't find her down in those cellars I feared the worst. But how...?"

Mme. Giry motioned her into the parlor. "Sit down and listen," she told Meg wearily, "there are a few things you need to know, before I can tell you about how Christine ended up here."

Meg obediently followed her mother, wondering what she would be about to hear.

"His name is Erik," Mme. Giry began her story, "and I've known him since we were children. In fact it was me who brought him to the Opéra Populaire." She told Meg how she had helped him escape from the gypsies and hide from the authorities, how he had left Paris for a few years when she had met her husband, and how he had returned shortly after her dear Jules' death, when Meg had only been a toddler.

"You see, Erik helped me get the job as ballet mistress," she ended. "I know he has done some bad things, but Buquet's death was self-defense, and for the rest..." She sighed. "He has not been himself lately. He cares so deeply for Christine. For the first time in his life he is in love, and … He took recent developments very hard. You must understand Meg, he has never been loved. He only knew fear and hatred. He was not prepared for this powerful emotion to hit him so hard. He could not handle Christine's uncertainty..."

Meg looked up surprised. "Her uncertainty?" she exclaimed. "Maman, that is the understatement of the year. Christine is scared of him. She loathes him. It is the Vicomte she is in love with..."

"No," Mme. Giry interrupted her daughter. "But let's not jump ahead. As I was saying, I owe Erik a lot, and I will always consider him a close friend, almost like a younger brother. He is not a bad person, he was just ill equipped to deal with the apparent rejection from the one person he loves with all his heart. I always knew that Christine's mysterious Angel of Music, her voice coach, was Erik. And yes, I tolerated their friendship. I had the impression as if they were good for each other. They were both so lonely, they both found solace in their music..."

Mme. Giry smiled. "I have to admit that I always hoped that one day..."

Meg stared at her. "How could you?" she asked angrily. "I thought you loved Christine, how could you deliver her into the hands of an unstable, disfigured person?" She shuddered at the memory of Erik's bare face, which she had briefly glimpsed during this evening's ill-fated performance. "You could not honestly expect her to develop feelings for somebody as repulsive as him!"

"There is more to Erik than his face," Mme. Giry retorted. "He is talented in so many ways, and he is capable of so much love. He has been through so much, if ever there was a man that deserved being loved, it would be him. And as it turns out," she informed Meg of the latest development, "Christine has reached that conclusion as well, for she told me earlier that she cannot marry the Vicomte, whom she loves more like a brother, and that she has accepted Erik's proposal. She is wearing his ring, and she is waiting for him to come for her, so that they can get married."

Meg stared at her mother as if the latter had suddenly grown a second head. "You can't be serious," she whispered, shaking her head in disbelief. "He must be forcing her somehow, threatening her or the Vicomte. Unless, that is, you want me to believe that Christine has for some reason gone mad. Maman, you cannot allow this! You must stop this marriage, or Christine will be unhappy for the rest of her life!"

Mme. Giry smiled. "Calm down, Meg," she told her daughter. "Christine is neither mad, nor is Erik forcing her. In fact, it was Christine who kissed him first. Out of her own free will, without him asking for it." And she repeated Christine's story to Meg.

"So, you see, she is not being coerced, she has simply finally realized which of her two suitors she really loves," Mme. Giry ended the narration. "And after seeing them together on that stage tonight, I have no doubts that her love is as deep and strong as Erik's and that they will be perfectly happy together. Believe me, I would try my best to stop her from marrying Erik, if I were not convinced of this."

Meg still had her doubts. She thought by herself that she would have to talk to Christine in private and ask her if she really had changed her mind on the murderous Phantom. Unlike her mother, she was not confident that such a marriage could lead to anything but disaster for her friend and she was determined to find out why Christine had suddenly broken her engagement to the Vicomte and accepted that disfigured criminal's proposal.

"Now tell me, what you know about Erik's whereabouts, and how you got his mask," her mother's words interrupted Meg's musings.

Meg bit her lip. "I don't really know anything," she quickly stated. "I went with the mob, because I was worried about Christine. I hoped to find her somewhere down in those cellars and to help free her from the clutches of her abductor. It took us a while to get to his lair, we took a wrong turn once or twice and had to retrace our steps when we met with a dead end of the tunnels. But when we finally arrived, there was nobody there. It was deserted, and in disarray. Several huge mirrors were broken, the shards scattered all around on the floor, and this mask was lying on a side table. I picked it up without thinking, don't ask me why."

Meg shrugged and after a short pause continued. "There was no trace of Christine. As worried as I was about her, I was getting a bit nervous. The mob turned more furious and violent by the minute. They started searching the lair for the criminal, they were extremely careless, upending furniture, breaking objects, some even got hurt by the objects that others had hurled around in frustration. I did not feel safe any longer, and I was not sure anymore if I would be able to help Christine, should we find her. Some of them seemed just too eager to find 'the monster and his whore' as they referred to Christine. I therefore thought it best to get away from them. I slipped into one of the dark corridors and made my way home. I got lost again once or twice, but finally found my way out of that subterranean labyrinth. Once I emerged from the cellars I was met with the raging fire which this madman caused when he dropped the chandelier on the audience."

Meg looked up. "I barely managed to get out alive. I am not sure what the chances of the others are to escape the flames. All those angry people hunting the Phantom down there in the corridors... they may not have been able to get out safely anymore." Meg nervously wrung her hands. "They may have been in a violent mood, intent on killing the Phantom, but to think that they may be surrounded by this inferno now, unable to get to safety... So many lives lost... the thought is distressing..."

Mme. Giry nodded. "Let's hope that they will all find a way out before it is too late," she said. "I am fairly certain that there are exits other than to the Opéra Populaire, though I would not know where to look for these. But I seem to recall that Erik mentioned such exits to me on occasion." She sighed. What Meg had told her, had caused her to worry. In a way it was comforting to know that the mob had found Erik's home deserted. He must therefore have been able to leave the lair before the angry crowd's arrival. But how much of a head-start did he have? Would it be enough for him to escape safely? The fact that Meg had described the mob as rather violent and blood-thirsty did not bode well. If Erik was still close when they arrived and for some reason or other they did succeed in catching up to him... She did not want to finish that thought.

"God, keep him safe," Mme. Giry prayed silently. "It would be too cruel if something happened to him now, that he finally has a future to look forward to, that he finally has found love. And Christine... if she lost him now, that she has finally realized how much he means to her..."

Aloud she said to Meg, "it might be best to hide this mask from Christine for the time being. And don't tell her anything of what you just told me. At least not until Erik has safely arrived. She worries enough about his safety already. Your story would probably upset her even more. Is that understood?"

Meg nodded. She had much more important things to discuss with her friend, namely she had to find out why the latter had suddenly agreed to marry that disfigured lunatic.

Xxx

The next morning, upon waking up, Christine's first thought was her angel. Apparently he had not arrived at Mme. Giry's home yet, and even though he had told her that he would most likely come for her only the following night, she could not help but worry. Where was he now? Was he safe and unharmed? What kept him away? And, most importantly, was he counting the hours till their reunion as impatiently as she was? Did he feel as incomplete without her as she did without him? Was he consumed by the same longing and desire as she was?

In order to keep Christine's mind occupied and provide some distraction, Mme. Giry brought her the now dry wedding dress, and together with Meg Christine thoroughly inspected it for any damage it might have sustained the previous night. To her immense relief the dress had not suffered much, a few stitches here and there and it would be as good as new. The two young girls immediately set to work and an hour later, the dress was repaired.

Meg was just putting away the sewing utensils, when she glimpsed Christine lovingly caressing the soft fabric. Meg gasped. "So it is true, you do want to marry the Pha... Erik?" she asked incredulously. Feeling anything other than disgust in the presence of the masked man was inconceivable in her opinion, but the way Christine seemed to cherish the dress that he had chosen for her, spoke of a deep, genuine affection.

Christine beamed at her. "Oh Meg, you cannot begin to imagine how much he means to me. He is my everything. He took care of me when my father died, he taught me to sing, without him I would be nothing, a second-rate dancer in the background. He nurtured me, broadened my horizon, educated me... over the years, when I still thought him to be an angel, we've talked about so many things. He always understood my problems, took them serious. I think I have fallen in love with him long ago without realizing it. I used to compare all young men to my angel, but none of them came even close. That's when I began to dream about how wonderful it would be if my angel were a flesh-and-blood human being, a man that would love me and that I could love. But when my dream came true, he was also the Phantom and I was confused, hurt. I had expected him to be perfect and had to learn that he wasn't. I felt betrayed and turned away from him."

Christine's voice sounded troubled. "I hurt him so much," she confided to Meg. "I turned to Raoul in my disappointment and became engaged to him. But last night... singing with Erik on stage reminded me of my previous feelings for him, and later... in his lair... when we kissed..." She turned a dark shade of crimson. "It was different," she whispered, "not at all like when Raoul kisses me. I did not want the kiss to end. That's when I knew that I love Erik much more and in a different way than Raoul. Raoul is a sweet man, and I certainly do like him a lot, but the love I hold for him is more like that for a brother. When he kisses me, I am perfectly calm and composed, but when Erik kissed me..."

Christine looked down, embarrassed. She could not tell anybody, not even Meg, what kind of longings and desires Erik's kiss had awoken in her, and even less what she and Erik had done other than kissing. "It was different," she simply stated.

Meg hugged her. She still was not entirely sure how she felt about Christine's new engagement, but at least she had no doubts anymore that her friend had entered this engagement of her own free will. "As long as you are certain that that is what you want," she smiled at Christine.

Christine returned the smile. "I am," she stated. "Without my angel I am incomplete, lost. I need him with me, at my side."

Their conversation was interrupted when the doorbell rang, announcing a visitor. Christine paled. "Raoul," she whispered nervously. "I had completely forgotten. He said he'd check on me today. I wish I would not have to see him now. This will be so awkward. He seems unable to accept that I broke our engagement..."

"Don't worry," Meg promised. "I will stick around and won't leave you alone with him even for a second. I understand that he may be reluctant to accept your change of heart, I myself had troubles believing it at first, but since you are determined, he'll eventually have to accept it."

Meg went to answer the door, welcoming the Vicomte in. "Christine, my dear," Raoul said, once he spotted his former fiancée, "I hope that you have somewhat recovered from the shocking experiences of last night."

From the sound of his voice Christine suspected that he was coming down with a cold. "It seems, I have suffered less than you," she therefore retorted. "For I am fairly well, whereas you seem to still be dealing with the aftereffects of our adventure in and around the subterranean lake."

"I am glad to hear you are well, Little Lotte," Raoul stated, ignoring her hint at his developing cold. "You will certainly agree that we need to put last night's events behind us as quickly as possible, and what better way of doing this than by cutting short our engagement and getting married as soon as possible..."

"I do not know what you are talking about," Christine interrupted him. "I already told you last night that I cannot marry you anymore. I am no longer your fiancée. I promised my angel to marry him, and I ..."

Raoul stared at her, disbelievingly. "Come to your senses, Lotte," he said somewhat harshly. "The nightmare is over. He cannot harm you now, nor me, for that matter. He is not here to threaten or punish you if you show your true feelings, and once you are finally mine, his power over you will be broken for good."

Christine shook her head, "I never thought you could be as stubborn, Raoul," she stated. "I do not know if you simply do not get it or if you do not want to accept it, but fact is, that I am not going to marry you. I already told you so yesterday. You are dear to me like a brother, but that's not enough to build a future upon. My angel, on the other hand, he is the other half of my soul, and I cannot live without him. He is the one I truly love, the one I will marry."

"So you have not heard the latest news yet?" Raoul spat at her. "I have no idea what kind of life you think you could have, married to a wanted criminal, always on the run, and I am not even sure you have thought about these problems yet, but fortunately you won't have to go through with this charade of a forced marriage. You are free to follow your heart again."

Raoul tried to put his arm around Christine's shoulder and pull her close, but she brushed his hand off. "What do you mean?" she asked, fear rising within her. She felt as if the room were spinning around her. "My angel," she panted. "Something horrible has happened to him..."

"I just talked to LeGrand," Raoul stated calmly, "you know, the elderly stagehand. He was with the mob last night. I wasn't going to tell you, but your insistence on honoring this so-called engagement, leaves me no choice. The mob hunted down that criminal last night, and beat him to death."

Christine's eyes widened in shock, her face suddenly ashen. A gut-wrenching sob escaped her lips before she passed out. Meg barely managed to catch her in time.


	4. End?

Ha, I knew it! You would be worried sick about our boy! For a moment I considered staying with Christine and telling you what happens with her next after a certain fo... um, Vicomte... told her the latest rumor. But then I figured it was time to see what had happened to Erik... Christine can wait till the next chapter.

Thank you once again to every single one of you, for reading, reviewing, putting on alert or adding to favorites! It is your continued support that keeps me going!

Anyway, on to the story, I know you are all eager to learn if Erik is truly... well, you'll have to read for yourselves. ;-)

I still don't own anything or anybody, just as a reminder.

Chapter 4 – End?

Once Christine had safely left the lair with Raoul, Erik finally could think of his own escape. There was a secret passageway hidden behind one of his large mirrors, but of course smashing just the one mirror to get access to it, would immediately draw attention to where he had gone, even if he covered it with a curtain after passing through. The shards of broken glass would give him away. Everybody would look around to see where the glass had come from and the secret passage would be discovered at once. It would be almost the same as him putting up a sign "Phantom went that way", with an arrow pointing towards his escape route.

He therefore had to smash all three of the mirrors. That way nobody would think twice about the pieces of broken glass lying around and immediately suspect the covered, third mirror to hold a secret. The mob was approaching fast, though, he therefore had to hurry. Erik had barely finished breaking all three mirrors, gone through the one which concealed the hidden exit and covered it up again with the curtain, when the angry crowd reached his lair.

Erik cursed inwardly. He had hoped to put a good distance between himself and his home before the mob arrived there. But now all that separated him from the murderous men looking for him, was that thin curtain. He had to be careful, the slightest sound could tip them off as to his whereabouts. As unlikely as it was that any one of them was paying much attention to the noise caused by him stepping on a piece of the crashed mirror, Erik still decided he had to be extra cautious and move slowly.

While Erik gingerly set one foot in front of the other, making sure to avoid the shards in his path, he listened to the angry shouts of the mob and the sounds of devastation coming from behind him. His heart broke at the thought of his valued belongings being ransacked and destroyed by that rowdy group. Then he smiled. These were only lifeless objects that could one day be replaced. His most cherished possession, his Christine, his living bride, was safe. They would not be able to harm her.

Slowly, slowly, Erik was making progress. He was nearing the intersection where he would have to turn left to reach the door that lead to the Rue Scribe exit. If he could make it past that door, he would be safe, even if the mob was coming after him by then. They would never even notice it, since it blended in with the walls of the corridor and one needed to know where it was located in order to spot it, and where to find the mechanism that opened it, in order to pass through.

Erik had almost reached the intersection. Another two hundred meters and he would be at the door that lead to safety, when he suddenly heard a scream behind. "There is a corridor behind that mirror," a man shouted, "I bet that's where the monster went with his whore!"

Erik immediately knew that time was of the essence. He did not care anymore, about where he stepped and if he made any noise. He had to get through the secret door, before they reached him, he simply had to! "Oh Christine," he whispered, "may your love guide me and protect me!"

He sprinted round the corner and towards the hidden door. He had reached it and was grasping for the stone he would have to push in order to open it, when he gasped. The wall was feeling hotter than it should, and the stone did not move as usual. Erik's eyes widened. "The fire!" he breathed as realization hit him. This particular part of the corridor was situated directly underneath the outer wall of the burning building. The heat and pressure from above had obviously affected the mechanism that opened the door and rendered it inoperable. He would not be able to escape that way, and with the pursuers directly behind him there was no chance he could turn around and try to reach another exit.

"There he is!" he heard someone screaming. "He is alone. I wonder where the bitch is!"

Erik's bile rose. How did they dare talk like that about Christine? He was about to lunge at the mob and kill as many of them as possible, to punish them for maligning his Christine. He turned around to face his aggressors, and stopped dead in his tracks. They were way too many. He would never be able to subdue them all. He might succeed in killing or maiming some of them, half maybe, but never all of them. He would be caught in the end. Caught and slaughtered. This was the end. He was trapped.

For a split-second Erik considered attacking them anyway, not to go down without a fight, but then he thought of Christine. There was absolute zero chance he would get out of this alive, that much he was certain of. How would this affect Christine? Losing him after what had happened between them earlier, would be hard enough on her, especially since she would now be considered a fallen woman and it would be difficult for her to find another husband. But how much pain would he cause her, if she learned that he had resorted to killing again?

No, he considered, he could not do that to her. Since he would not be able anymore to marry her and thus restore her honor, she should at least not have to be ashamed of the man she had given herself to. He would proof to her that he was worthy of her love. It would be his last, parting gift to his Christine.

Erik faced his pursuers, his hands raised to show that he was unarmed. "There is no need to attack," he told them, "I surrender. I will go with you without a fight..." He hoped the mob would accept his offer of surrender. It was his last, best chance to stay alive at least for the time being and maybe plan an escape later.

"Monster! This is another one of your tricks, we are not taking any risks!" one man screamed, another man added, "let's just finish him off, or he will kill us all!"

Erik felt something hard hit his right temple, his head exploded in a wave of pain. He had a feeling as if he were falling into a bottomless abyss, and then darkness enveloped him.

Xxxx

Nadir Khan had just finished his breakfast when his loyal servant Darius stormed into the room in unusual haste. Nadir looked up annoyed. "What is the matter, Darius?" he asked, then gasped as he noticed the state of shock his servant was in.

"Master," Darius almost screamed at him. "There was a fire at the Opéra Populaire last night! I just heard the news from the postman. They say that..." he took a deep breath, trying to steady his voice, "they say that the Phantom... I mean master Erik, caused it by dropping a chandelier on the audience, and he killed a singer and abducted another, and when some scene shifters and others went for him they caught him and ..."

Nadir's eyes widened in shock. "Spit it out, man!" he ordered, grasping the table for support. "What is the matter with Erik? Where did they take him?" He was seriously worried now. He had known the disfigured man for years and considered him a friend. A close one, too, and the only one he had in this foreign country. Other than Darius, of course.

"Dead," Darius whispered. "They killed him on the spot. Hit him over the head with a heavy candlestick they had picked up in his lair, then beat the unconscious man to death."

"Oh Allah!" Nadir felt as if somebody had pulled the floor from underneath him. He was glad he was sitting or he would probably have fallen. "Is there... I mean... the body... what did they do with it? Can we at least give him a decent burial?"

Darius shook his head. "They left it where they killed him, somewhere in the corridors underneath the Opéra. The building was burning, and once they had … finished him off... they realized that their own lives were in danger and ran." The loyal servant was fighting back tears now. He knew how fond his master had been of the so-called Phantom, and, truth be told, Darius also had a soft spot in his heart for his master's only friend. With him he could speak in his native tongue...

Nadir sighed in relief. All was not lost then, there was a chance he could retrieve his friend's body and make sure Erik would have the burial every human being deserved. He stood up quickly, went over to his desk and rummaged through one of the drawers until he found a large key.

"What are you waiting for?" he asked Darius. "Come, let's go and look for the body. We owe it to Erik to see to it that he can rest in a grave and not rot somewhere in a cellar under the ruins of a burnt down building. Whatever he may have done, whatever has happened last night, I knew him better than most, and I know that despite all evidence to the contrary he was a decent man. He deserves a tomb like any other man."

Darius hesitated. "The Opéra is not supposed to be safe," he mumbled. "They expect the roof to cave in after the fire... "

Nadir was already halfway through the door. "The sooner we find him, the sooner we will be out of there again and safe, hopefully long before the building collapses on top of us. Now come, or do you think, I can carry Erik's body alone?"

Xxxx

A few minutes later, Nadir used his key to open the secret entrance to Erik's subterranean world in Rue Scribe. He and Darius quickly slipped in and closed the door behind themselves, making sure that nobody had seen them enter.

Once inside, Nadir lit a candle and both men hastened along the dark corridor. Once they reached the door that Erik had so desperately tried to open, when the mob had closed in on him, they immediately noticed that it was skewed, hanging at an odd angle.

"Allah," Nadir whispered. "I bet the door is stuck and the opening mechanism on the other side does not work. If Erik tried to get out here, he would have been like caught in a trap..." He pushed the handle that served to open the door from their side, but had difficulty opening it. "Give me a hand," he told Darius. "We may have to use brute force in order to open that door, but we have to get in if we want to..." He could not finish his sentence, overcome by grieve over the loss of his friend.

Darius nodded silently and joined his forces with his master's. After a few pushes and shoves the door finally gave way and the two men stumbled through. They almost would have tripped over something lying on the floor, but managed to stop themselves in time, before stomping on the blood-covered body that lay sprawled on the floor, lifeless.

Both men's eyes widened in shock. Their worst fears had not prepared them for the horrible sight in front of them. Erik's body was a bloody mess, his clothes torn and ripped, he had obviously been hit hard with all sorts of items, among them blunt, heavy objects, since the odd angles of his limbs suggested broken bones as well.

Nadir gagged. "My poor friend," he whispered, "having to end that way." He crouched down next to the body, in an attempt to close the broken eyes, when he suddenly gasped. Was one of Erik's eyelids fluttering? No, he was probably imagining things. Surely the flickering light of the candle was responsible for making it seem as if there were still life in that body. That and his own heart, which refused to accept that his friend was truly gone.

Nadir summoned all his courage and reached for Erik's face once more in order to close his friend's eyes, when he stopped again. He had inadvertently brushed over the blood-crusted deformity and he had felt... He could not have imagined that, or could he? He gently laid his hand on Erik's right temple, feeling for the huge, pulsating vein there. Once he found it, he gasped. He had not been mistaken. There was a pulse there, faint, very faint, but there nevertheless. Nadir quickly put his ear to Erik's chest to check for a heartbeat.

"He is alive," he then announced to Darius, "just barely, and I doubt he will stay that way much longer... but he is not dead yet."

Darius gasped. "What do we do now?" he asked. "Can we move him?"

Nadir nodded. "We will have to try at least. We cannot leave him here. The building is about to collapse, and even if it were not, this place is too damp and dirty for an injured man. He may not survive the transport, though. He seems to have lost a lot of blood, he probably has suffered some internal injuries as well, and his body is in shock. He is stiff and ice-cold to the touch like a corpse. No wonder, the mob thought they had finished him off. If we had gotten to him last night, maybe, he'd have stood a chance, but right now, I don't think he'll make it. If we leave him here he will most certainly die, will probably be dead within the hour. If there is even the tiniest chance that he can survive this, then we must act quickly. His lair is close by. I'll go and see if I can find a sheet or blanket or something we could wrap him in so that we can carry him without hurting him even more. Fortunately, we don't live too far away. If we avoid the crowded streets, we should be able to get him home."

Xxxx

Half an hour later, Nadir and Darius arrived at their flat, panting under the burden of Erik's stiff body. They cautiously put Erik down on the bed and checked him for lifesigns. The pulse was still there, though if possible even fainter than it had been before, and the heartbeat was slow and irregular, but there was no doubt that Erik was still alive.

For hours the two men worked on cleaning up and disinfecting their friend's many wounds. There hardly was a square inch of undamaged skin to be found on his upper torso, Erik was covered in bruises, swellings, and open wounds that had bled heavily and were now beginning to get inflamed. Nadir treated every single injury, set the bones in Erik's broken limbs and fingered his torso in order to determine internal injuries.

Under his friends' ministrations, Erik's body was slowly coming out of shock, his ice-cold limbs growing hotter almost by the minute, and once Nadir had finished his triage, Erik was burning up with a dangerously high fever.

Nadir sadly shook his head. "We were hours too late," he sighed. "I don't think he has got a chance. Even though we Persians have some herbs that French medicine does know nothing about, I doubt we will get him through this. We may have to bury him after all..."

Darius cleared his throat to get his master's attention. "Master, is there somebody we should inform of … " he paused to wipe a few tears from his cheeks. "Of the fact that master Erik is still alive?" he asked. "Maybe that friend of his, the ballet mistress, what is her name? Or the young diva he fancied?"

Nadir shook his head. "I don't think so," he decided. "Last thing I heard, the girl does not care about him anyway. She is probably glad to be rid of him," he added bitterly. He felt strong compassion for his friend's love problems. After all those years, Erik had finally found a woman he loved with all his heart, and the young diva had turned away from him the moment she had seen his face and accepted the advances of another, very handsome suitor, thus driving Erik insane with jealousy. No, that woman would at best be frightened by the news that her disfigured stalker was not quite dead yet. It was probably best to let her believe the Phantom had indeed perished the previous night. As to the other one, Antoinette Giry...

"Mme. Giry, the ballet mistress, on the other hand, might care," Nadir voiced his thoughts. "But she has probably already heard of his death. It would be too cruel to raise her hopes by telling her he is alive, only for her to have to watch him die a few hours later. If he were conscious, I would consider calling for her, but the way things are..." He looked down at the bandaged patient. Erik looked so peaceful, but also frail and vulnerable. Nadir put a damp cloth on his friend's feverish brow to cool him down somewhat. "He probably won't regain consciousness again," he murmured. "Whatever strength he has left after the blood-loss and pain he has endured, will soon be exhausted by his attempt to fight off that terrible fever. I doubt he will live through the night."

Darius nodded. "I just thought, maybe she would want to be with him, when.. you know..." His voice broke.

"It would cause her pain," Nadir repeated. "This is no sight for a woman. And he will not be alone, when... well, we will be with him till the end. And in the unlikely case that he should beat all odds and .. I mean should he get well enough that we can be reasonably certain that he will live, then there will still be time enough to tell her and bring her here."

The two men sat down next to Erik's bed and took turns sponging down his fever-hot body, feeding him small spoonfuls of water to prevent dehydration and praying to their God to keep their friend alive.


	5. Loss

Hi everybody, sorry for the late update! Thank you all for your patience! Many thanks go to all of you who read this story, to those who have put it on alert or added to their favorites and especially to my many reviewers! I could not do it without you and your support.

Now get your tissues out, as we learn how Christine deals with the news of Erik's supposed death.

I still don't own anything or anybody, but I will try to update a bit more regularly in the future. I have not abandoned a story yet, and won't start doing so with this one!

Chapter 5 – Loss

Meg let Christine's lifeless body slowly glide to the floor. "Help me," she panted, trying her best to deal with the dead weight of her unconscious friend. "We need to get her on the sofa over there!"

Raoul hesitantly grabbed Christine's feet and together he and Meg managed to move Christine's limp form onto the sofa. They had barely finished their task, when a sharp voice asked, "what is going on here? What is the matter with Christine?"

Meg turned around, coming face to face with her mother. Mme. Giry's eyes sparkled angrily as she noticed Raoul caressing Christine's pale cheeks. "Monsieur le Vicomte," the ballet mistress chastised the young man. "Are you somehow responsible for the state I find Christine in? Have you maybe tried again to force her to honor that engagement, that she chose to dissolve?" Her eyes bore into him. "What are you even doing here?" Mme. Giry continued her rant. "Could you not wait for my return, before making your visit? Do these two young ladies mean so little to you that you deliberately risk their reputation by paying them a visit when they are not properly chaperoned?" Her voice had a cutting edge to it, like a blade of thin oriental steel.

"I..." Raoul began uneasily. "No formalities are needed," he then added more confidently, "since Christine is my fiancée, about to become my wife."

Mme. Giry sighed. She did not feel up to dealing with the stubborn young man right now. She was already in a particularly bad mood, her nerves frayed, without this further complication. She had been to the city to try and find out how badly damaged the Opéra Populaire was, and whether or not they could expect a reopening within a reasonable time-frame. The news she had heard while making her inquiries, had been rather disconcerting. One rumor in particular had her worried. She refused to believe what one of the seamstresses had told her, surely Erik could not be...?

Mme. Giry forced herself to return to the problem at hand. Christine had to be her first priority now, for if that rumor was true, the young woman would be devastated and in need of loving support. She turned towards her daughter. "Meg, darling, would you get me some cold water? We need to revive Christine." Meg nodded and left for the kitchen.

The moment Meg was gone, Mme. Giry confronted the Vicomte. "Christine is not your fiancée anymore," she said harshly. "You are well aware whose ring she is wearing now. So what were you doing here in the absence of a suitable chaperone for my two girls?"

Raoul laughed nervously. "We all know that he was forcing her," he stated uneasily. "She had no choice but to accept his proposal. But there is no need any longer for her to continue with this charade. She is free of her extorted promise, and thus can now follow her heart and marry me, since the monster met his end at the hands of Piangi's avengers. Divine justice was served, the criminal beast received his due punishment." He smiled mischievously. "I hope his death was slow and painful," he added.

Mme. Giry was appalled. The rumor, that terrible rumor that she had wanted to withhold from Christine for as long as possible, had the poor girl heard it already, and had it been communicated to her in such a cold, heartless way? No wonder, Christine had fainted.

"You told Christine that?" she whispered, shocked. "You told her in such cruel words that the man she loves, the man she wants to spend the rest of her life with, that he suffered a violent, painful death?"

Raoul fidgeted. Why was everybody pretending that his Christine actually cared for that – thing? "She would have heard about his demise eventually," he defended himself. "How could I know she would not be overjoyed to learn that she is finally free of this manipulator?" He straightened his posture and added condescendingly, "and who are you to say that the reason for her fainting was not relief, the pressure finally gone,the weight lifted from her shoulders? A delayed reaction to what she has been through recently?"

Mme. Giry barely contained her anger at this conceited young nobleman. "Go," she whispered menacingly. "Leave, before she wakes up. I have a feeling that once she comes to, you will be the last person she'll want to see."

Raoul gasped. He could not remember the last time anybody had dared talk to him like that. "I am going now," he announced pompously. "You know where to find me when my fiancée awakes and asks for me." He turned on his heels and stormed out.

Mme. Giry bit her lip. Had it been wise to anger the Vicomte like that? What if the rumor about Erik's supposed death at the hands of the mob turned out to be true? Would Christine want to lead a solitary life in that case, or was it conceivable that sooner or later she might decide to settle for second-best and marry her childhood friend after all? Mme. Giry shook her head. She did not even know for sure yet whether or not Erik really was dead. It was way too early to tell what might happen if the rumor turned out to be true. There was no time for idle speculations. Christine now needed her full attention.

Mme. Giry sat down on the sofa next to Christine and cradled the young woman in her arms. "Wake up," she whispered, gently rubbing Christine's temples. When Meg returned with a glass of water, Mme. Giry sprinkled the cold liquid on Christine's face to shock her back into consciousness.

Finally Christine's eyelids fluttered under the Girys' loving ministrations and she slowly opened her eyes. "My Angel!" she gasped, desperation in her voice. "Where is he? Raoul said..." Her eyes once again widened in shock and her breathing became irregular, as she remembered what Raoul had said about the man she loved.

"Sh," Mme. Giry cooed, wrapping her arms around Christine to prevent her from going into shock again. "Calm down. Raoul is gone. He won't hurt you anymore."

Christine nodded, her heart still aching with pain over what the Vicomte had told her. "He said," she whispered, shaking violently, "he said Erik was..." She could not finish the sentence, her chest heaving with heavy sobs.

"Relax," Mme. Giry tried again. "We don't know if it's true. Erik may be fine. But what I do know for sure is that he would want you to be calm and composed. Erik would not want you to be so agitated. Keep that in mind, always."

Christine closed her eyes. "He said LeGrand told him," she mumbled. "LeGrand is not a liar..." Tears streaked down her face. "What if...," she swallowed hard before continuing, "what if my Angel, my dear Erik is really... what if they..."

"LeGrand may have been mistaken," Mme. Giry tried to comfort the stricken young woman. "They may have come across a body disfigured by burn marks and thought it was Erik, or..."

Christine shook her head. "He said they beat my Angel to death," she whispered. "How much he must have suffered!"

"LeGrand may still have been mistaken," Mme. Giry held Christine in a tight embrace, trying to provide some comfort that she herself was in desperate need of as well. How likely was it that LeGrand was wrong? Christine was right, that man was no liar. If he said they had killed the Phantom, then chances were, that was exactly what had happened. "Maybe they beat somebody else, or maybe they just beat him unconscious. We will see tonight. Erik promised to come for you tonight, didn't he?"

Christine nodded sobbing. "Yes, but now he never will...," she cried.

Mme. Giry pulled her even closer. "Let's wait and see," she cooed. "If he is injured and unable to come, I am sure he will find a way to send us a message. For now you calm down, since we have no proof yet, that anything really has happened to him. But even if LeGrand was right, if Erik..." Mme. Giry fought back tears of her own. "Even then, I am sure he would not want you to be so agitated and desperate. He loves you. He would want you to take care of yourself and be at peace."

Christine put on a brave face. "I cannot go on without him," she whispered. "I may only have realized it last night, but Erik is my everything. He is my whole world. He means more to me than even my music. Without him, I will be lost. A leaf, floating on the wind..."

The next few hours seemed to stretch out into eternity. Christine felt like evening would never come. She paced up and down restlessly, one minute giving in to hope that maybe, just maybe, Erik had escaped the mob by a miracle, the next one fighting off horror visions of her angel's broken body, covered in blood. "Let him not have suffered too badly," she prayed one minute. "Let it have been quick and painless for him, there has been so much pain in his life already." The next moment she fervently begged the Holy Virgin and all the Saints to keep her Erik safe, to let him return to her unharmed.

Christine became more and more nervous as the hours went by. The day turned into evening, and finally night, but neither Erik nor a message from him arrived. At midnight, all three ladies had to accept that chances of hearing from Erik ever again were now next to nil. As troubled as Mme. Giry felt at the constantly growing certainty that her friend was truly gone, she had to suppress her own feelings in order to lend support to the deathly pale young woman in front of her.

"Christine," she softly said, reaching for the young woman to stop her frantic pacing. "You need to rest now. It won't help Erik if you ruin yourself."

Christine threw herself into the older woman's arms. "Nothing can help him now anymore," she sobbed. "He must be dead as LeGrand told Raoul. He would have come for me if he were still alive or would at least have sent me a note. That he hasn't..." She winced. "Beaten to death," she murmured, shuddering. "Can you imagine the pain? It probably took a while. He must have suffered so much. And he was all alone, with nobody to comfort him..."

Christine was about to go into shock again, overwhelmed by compassion for her beloved angel's dreadful end, as well as by fear of how she could continue without him. She could not imagine a life, where she would never hear his melodious voice again, never see his beloved ugly face again, not to feel his strong arms around her anymore, those arms that protected her and kept her safe, never to feel his passionate kisses anymore, never to... She closed her eyes. At least she had not denied him. At least she had been able to experience heaven in his arms once. At least he had not had to die without knowing love.

"He knew that you loved him," Mme. Giry tried to comfort her. "I am sure this knowledge helped him deal with his fate. But keep in mind that he loved you just as much. And I am sure his love is still with you. If he looks down on you now..."

Christine stared at her. "Are you so sure?" she asked nervously, "are you sure he is... that God has forgiven him?"

Mme. Giry smiled. "I am sure," she said confidently. "He comforted a lonely, fatherless child and gave her the will to carry on, that should count for something with the Almighty. And his violent death certainly purged him of whatever sins he might have committed. He is looking down on you now, together with your father, and neither of them would want you to be so desperate. They would want you to be strong and live on and honor their memory. Do it for them. Show them your love by not causing them any more worry. Take care of yourself, try to relax and rest."

Christine looked up at the ballet mistress, her face tear-stained. "How can I?" she whispered. "When everything in me is so raw, when my heart is so heavy and feels like it would break any moment? When I do not know how I can survive another day without my angel?"

Mme. Giry sighed. Erik's death was weighing on her heavily as well, but she had to suppress her own grief, in order to be able to help the widowed bride, who seemed to be ready to break down. "Focus on your memories," she told Christine. "Remember all the good times the two of you had together. Your music, your lessons. Be grateful for what you have had instead of dwelling too much on what you cannot have anymore. And remember that he himself would want you to be strong. How can he find peace in the afterlife knowing that you are taking his loss so hard?"

Christine did not seem to listen, she just continued sobbing. "Why did he send me away with Raoul?" she whispered. "I could have gone with him. I could have died with him. We could have been together, till the end and beyond..."

Mme. Giry began to fear for Christine. In her current frame of mind it was not unlikely that the young woman might do something desperate in an attempt to follow her beloved. "You need to sleep now," she tried again. "Your nerves are frayed, you need rest in order to recover from that blow."

Christine stared at her wildly. "How can you suggest I sleep?" she rasped. "How do you think I can find rest now, knowing that my Angel... that Erik died a horrible, painful death? Even assuming I could fall asleep, do you really think I would not be haunted by nightmares, plagued by visions of his ordeal? The thought alone that his body might be lying somewhere in the cellars of the Opéra Populaire now, ..." She interrupted herself. "Do you think," she began again hesitantly, "I mean, will it be possible to go there and look for him? I would want him to be buried next to my papa..."

Mme. Giry sadly shook her head. "I am afraid not," she told Christine. "The Opéra is off limits. The building has been declared unsafe. They expect the roof to cave in. We will not be allowed to enter for any reason." As Christine's tears started to flow again, she added softly, "think about it as Erik being laid to rest in the only place where he ever felt somewhat at home. The ruins of the Opéra Populaire are probably where he would have wanted to be buried anyway. He is in death where he spent his life."

Christine sobbed. "I will not even have a grave to go to for comfort, as I have with my papa," she cried.

Mme. Giry gently brushed a few stray locks out of Christine's face. "You won't need that," she told the younger woman. "He will always be with you. In your heart."

Christine nodded unconvinced. "It hurts so much to think that he is gone, that he has left me alone," she whined. "Now I am truly alone."

Mme. Giry resolutely shook her head. "No, you are not," she told the grieving woman. "You have me and Meg. We are your family now. You belong with us, we will not abandon you. Erik was my friend as well, I cared about him a lot. He was almost like a younger brother to me. His fiancée therefore certainly will always have a home with me. Now you get changed for bed, you need to rest. Since you are too agitated, I will have to give you something so that you can sleep. Tomorrow, when you are properly rested, I will tell you how I met Erik all those years ago, when we both were still children." She forced a smile on her lips that her eyes knew nothing about. "We will keep him alive in our memories."

When Meg, who was seriously worried about her friend, joined her mother's pleas for Christine to get some rest, the latter finally agreed to try to sleep. Christine obediently drank the glass of water in which Mme. Giry had dissolved some white powder, and within minutes dozed off and fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep.

Mme. Giry breathed a sigh of relief. At least for the moment Christine was at peace. But what about the next day? Would the pain over Erik's loss have settled somewhat and Christine be calm again? She was worried about the young woman. The emotional stress for Christine must be enormous. Losing a loved one was always devastating. Mme. Giry only knew too well from personal experience how it felt to have the man you loved ripped from you unexpectedly. But Christine's situation was probably even worse. The realization of her love, the brief happiness of being engaged to the man who had held her heart and soul captive for over ten years, and the sudden loss of him had all occurred within a few hours. How could one deal with such a rapid succession of such different emotions? Would Christine be able to find peace in the knowledge of Erik's undying love for her or would his loss be too much for her, coming on the heels of her blossoming love for her former teacher?

Mme. Giry lay awake half the night, praying for Christine to be strong enough to carry on without Erik, and talking to her dead friend as if he were standing right next to her, promising him that she would watch over his bride for him and keep her safe, always.

When Christine rose from her bed the next morning, she was only a shadow of her former self. Her features were pale and haggard, and the first words she muttered were, "I need new clothes anyway, since my things were destroyed in the fire. Please, help me get a black dress. I need to properly mourn my angel."


	6. Hope

Hi everybody! (Shyly looking around) Have I offended you somehow? What did I do wrong? (bursts into tears) Only three reviews last chapter? (considers jumping off a bridge).

Anyway, thank you to my three reviewers and to those that are still reading, as well as to those who have added this story to their favorites or put it on alert. It is good to know that *somebody* cares for this story, even tough it may be a bit sad for now...

I do not own anything or anybody. Drat, why did I bring that up? Now I am truly depressed... :-(

Chapter 6 – Hope

A few days passed, but while Christine had stopped crying, her emotional state was still precarious. Most of the time she was just sitting in a chair, dressed in black – she had categorically refused to wear any other color – staring at the wall. Even though she slept at night thanks to Mme. Giry's drug, she did not look well rested. Her features were drawn and haggard, and there were dark rings around her eyes. Her once luscious curls had lost their sheen and were now lifelessly hanging down her back, her rare movements were slow and listless. It was as if all life and energy had left her, the only part of her looking somewhat alive being her eyes – those huge, dark orbs that spoke of loss and pain in a more vivid way than words ever could.

Mme. Giry and Meg were very worried about Christine and tried their best to comfort her and be there for her, but she hardly ever reacted to their well-meaning efforts to cheer her up. Christine barely ate and drank, and it was quickly becoming obvious that she was on the best way to damage her own health.

One morning, about ten days after the fire at the Opéra Populaire, Mme. Giry once again tried to get Christine to join her and Meg for breakfast. "Christine, you must take better care of you," she admonished the young woman. "Erik would be very angry with you if he knew how you are neglecting yourself right now. Think of how it must hurt him to know that you are so devastated. And you are well aware of how terrifying he could be when angry!"

A tiny smile played across Christine's lips for a second. Oh, she remembered Erik's temper only too well. At one time his outbursts had frightened her, but now! What would she not give for the pleasure of being able to witness one such flare of his temper again! "I miss him so," she whispered, her voice so low, it was barely audible.

"I know," Mme. Giry said softly. Her heart went out to Christine and she cursed herself for once having dreamed of her two protégés finding happiness together. She had gotten her wish after all, Christine did return Erik's love, but how much better off the young woman would be if she did not care for her former teacher that much, if she had been able to love her childhood friend.

Mme. Giry gently put her arm around Christine's shoulders and lead her to the table, just as Meg came in from the kitchen, carrying a tray with freshly-brewed coffee and crispy chocolate croissants.

Christine had not felt hungry at all, when Mme. Giry had told her that breakfast was ready. She had only followed the older woman because she was too weary to put up a fight about something like that. She decided she would just sit at the table with the two Girys, force one or two bites down to please her friends and then excuse herself again. But when Meg entered with the tray Christine suddenly felt queasy. Had she never before noticed how truly nauseating the smell of coffee was? And croissants? At the mere thought of biting into such a pastry, Christine felt bile rise within her and her body shook at the effort to suppress the sudden urge to vomit.

Mme. Giry and Meg were at her side at once. "What is the matter, Christine?" they asked worriedly. Christine only shook her head, unable to speak, as her mouth was filling fast with a disgusting substance. She broke lose from her friends' grip and ran to the bathroom where she was violently sick.

Mme. Giry and Meg followed her and seemed even more worried when they found Christine retching and spitting, emptying her stomach of what little could still be in there from the previous night's dinner.

"Do you have an upset stomach?" Meg asked softly, rubbing her friend's back to ease the convulsive retching. "Have you eaten anything that did not agree with you? Maybe you should lie down and rest."

Christine nodded weakly. She had no idea what could have caused her sudden illness, since she had barely eaten anything the day before, and certainly nothing that could have caused her innards to react in such a way, but she did not really care. She felt so miserable already that this additional problem only seemed like a welcome excuse to hide away in her room.

Mme. Giry stared at Christine. The girl had seemed physically fine just a few minutes ago. Was it likely that an illness would manifest itself so suddenly? She was also well aware of the fact that Christine had not really eaten much in days, and that her and Meg had consumed the same food. But of the three of them only Christine was feeling sick, neither she herself nor Meg were showing any symptoms. There was another explanation for sudden, violent sickness, though, especially when it happened in the morning. But that could not possibly be, or could it? She shook her head. No, Christine was a virtuous girl, and as annoyed as Mme. Giry was with the Vicomte right now, she could not quite imagine him seducing, or worse, forcing a girl that he was planning to make his wife. Whatever had caused Christine's current problem, it could not be that.

Christine was allowed to retire to her room. She lay down on her bed and tried to relax, but the only thing she could think of were her Angel's expressive eyes broken in death, the horrible pain he must have endured and how lonely his death must have been. "As lonely as his life," she whispered sadly, thinking that her life would now be just as lonely and empty as his had been.

Christine chastised herself for not realizing her love for her angel sooner. "If only I had known how much he means to me," she thought. "We could have gone away together long ago. Before "Il Muto", before I started to doubt him. We could be married now and happy, safe and together..."

The Girys checked on Christine repeatedly during the day. Christine's condition seemed to improve. The incident from the morning did not repeat itself, and in the evening Christine was able to eat a few bites of bread. "You will hopefully be fine again tomorrow," Meg told her cheerfully. "I am glad that you are feeling a bit better already."

Christine nodded weakly. For all she cared, she would lie in that bed forever without food, slowly starving herself to death. "At least then I could be with my angel," she thought, "and papa would be there as well and give us his blessing..."

The next morning, Christine got up at the insistence of Mme. Giry. Christine's malaise seemed to have passed, she definitely had been able to hold down the food she had consumed for dinner. "You must be really hungry now," the ballet mistress smiled at her surrogate daughter. "Downright ravenous..."

Christine sighed. Even though she had already lost some weight since that terrible night, she had no appetite. To tell the truth, she even felt slightly disgusted at the thought of food. She tried to suppress that growing unease. "It is probably a reaction to what happened yesterday," Christine tried to convince herself. "Somehow my stomach seems to remember that incident and expects it to repeat itself." Though she had to admit that any illness that brought her closer to death, and thus a reunion with her beloved, would be welcome.

The moment Christine reached the breakfast table and saw the food, she knew that she would not be able to even sit down there without becoming violently sick again. The mere sight and smell of the food was enough to make her retch. Just like the day before she stormed out, making her way to the bathroom as fast as she could, reaching it just in time before the vomiting started again.

Mme. Giry watched Christine in shock. Once, such sudden, violent sickness could be chalked up to an upset stomach, however unlikely that seemed, but twice? She remembered the suspicion she had discarded so quickly the day before and wondered if she had not been right after all. But what if? What if Christine was indeed carrying the Vicomte's child? In that case she would somehow have to force Christine to marry her former fiancé, if for no other reason than to ensure the baby's rights as a de Chagny. But how could Christine be convinced to marry the Vicomte, when all she could think about was Erik and the love she felt for him?

Once Christine was again comfortably settled in her bed, Mme. Giry sent Meg out of the room under a pretense. She did not want her daughter to be present at the conversation she needed to have with Christine now. Topics such as sexuality and pregnancy were not suitable for a young lady. It was hard enough that she had to bring up theses subjects with Christine.

As soon as Meg had left the room, Mme. Giry took Christine's hand and asked softly, "is there anything you want to tell me, my dear?"

Christine looked at her uncomprehendingly. "What do you mean?" she asked nervously. "Did I eat something strange you are not aware of, maybe take some poison or something?" She shook her head sadly. "I am not saying I would not do that if I had access to such substances," she confessed, "but the truth is, I do not and therefore cannot follow my angel that easily."

Mme. Giry sighed. It was hard to imagine a girl as innocent as Christine, who apparently did not even get what she had been implying, having been corrupted by a man. She shook her head. "That's not what I meant," she retorted, unsure what to say next. "It is just... I mean, please don't take this the wrong way, Christine, I know you are a good girl, but … well... at the Opéra, I have seen a lot of things, and there have been several girls over the years, who...," she blushed deeply. This was even harder than she had expected.

Christine stared at Mme. Giry. She had not the faintest idea what the latter was talking about. "Is it a disease?" she asked. "Will I die? Will I be able to follow my angel?"

Mme. Giry shook her head. "Have you,... um...," she began again. "What I want to ask is... when was the last time you had your... you know... your womanly monthly flow?"

Now it was Christine's turn to blush at such a personal question. Also, this topic was the least of her concerns at the moment. But then she began to think. She had lost track of time. What day was it anyway? How long had her angel been dead already? Was it a week, two? A month? She certainly had not paid attention to the passing of time. But the last time she had bled, she remembered quite clearly. It had been during the time they rehearsed for "Don Juan Triumphant". The sets had not been ready yet, and the costumes were being fitted. It must have been what – three weeks before opening night, give or take a day?

As she told Mme. Giry the approximate time-frame of her last period, the latter became even more serious. "Christine, in that case I have to ask you," she began, trying to sound as understanding and accepting as possible, even though she was appalled at what now seemed to be more and more of a certainty. "Is there a possibility... have you and the Vicomte... could you... is there a chance you might be pregnant?" After blurting out the last word, Mme. Giry took a deep breath. There, she had said it. The terrible suspicion was finally out in the open. How would Christine react now? If she was wrong, would Christine ever forgive her for having thought her capable of such shameless behavior?

Christine almost laughed. "You think me and Raoul?" she asked incredulously. "I would not..." Then she stopped dead. No, not Raoul, that was impossible, but what if? Her features became more animated, her eyes radiated with hope, and a tiny smile formed around Christine's lips as she protectively laid her hand upon her abdomen. "You mean, the sickness... the vomiting... it could be a symptom of... I could be carrying my angel's child?"

Mme. Giry stared at her. That reaction was the last thing she had expected. "Erik?" she asked incredulously. "You and _Erik_ did...you made... love?" How could that be? If she was right, it must have happened fairly recently, but Christine and Erik had not seen each other for weeks before that last night.

Christine blushed deeply. She had not wanted to reveal that detail to anybody ever, but in her excitement about a possible pregnancy she had not thought about what she was implicitly admitting to by considering the possibility of being with child.

Christine nodded, expecting to be condemned by the strict, elderly woman. "Yes," she whispered. "That night, after we kissed. He … he did not believe I really meant it, he asked me to prove to him that I was his and I... " she looked down.

Mme. Giry sighed. Now that Christine had admitted to the deed, there was little doubt left that she was indeed expecting – a bastard child. The child of a disfigured, murderous freak. At least, that was how the world would see it. Christine would be shunned by everybody, if this were to become known. She would never be able to find work again with her reputation so seriously tarnished. What could they do now? How could she protect Christine and the innocent baby?

"So if I am right and you truly are... then the father would be Erik?" Mme. Giry asked to be absolutely sure.

Christine nodded. "He is the only one," she whispered. "And there will never be another. What we... I mean... with anybody else it would have been so awkward and embarrassing," she confessed. "I don't think I could do this with anybody other than my angel, and I never will. Do you think," she added hesitantly. "Could it be true? Did my angel leave me such a wonderful gift to comfort me, to give my life new meaning?"

Mme Giry groaned. "I fear I am right," she stated nervously.

"You fear?" Christine looked at her incredulously. "I hope you are right! I wish I could at least have Erik's baby, if I cannot have him by my side."

Mme. Giry understood only too well. After all, when her husband had died, baby Meg had been what kept her going. Having her daughter to care for, the legacy her dear Jules had left her, had given her life purpose. It was only natural that Christine would feel the same way. "I know," she said, wrapping an arm around Christine and holding her close. "It's just, your reputation... it would be hard for you and the baby, especially if it should inherit.. if it looked like Erik..."

Christine smiled. "I think I would love my baby even more if it looked like my angel," she said, looking down at her flat stomach, as if willing it to show a slight bulge that would confirm the existence of Erik's child within her. Then she turned to Mme. Giry. "Is there a way," she began nervously, "can I find out for sure? I need to know..."

Mme. Giry was appalled. She did not want to consult a doctor or midwife just yet, for even if she were wrong, Christine's reputation would be ruined. She would try to keep Christine's condition a secret for as long as possible. "I do not think you should see anybody to confirm our suspicion," she finally said. "If your morning sickness continues and your flow does not set in within the next few days, then chances are we are right. In which case we will have to think about what we want to do in order to keep up your reputation."

Christine stared at her. "You are not suggesting I should hide away somewhere until the baby is born then give it up for adoption and return, pretending nothing has happened?" she asked. "I would never give up my baby, the last thing I have left of my angel..."

"Nobody is asking that of you," Mme. Giry calmed Christine, although she had to admit that that would be the easiest solution. "It's just you not being married..."

"I am not getting married to somebody who is not my child's father, either," Christine refused adamantly. "It would not be fair to the man anyway, not to tell him, and who would want me, knowing that I am carrying my angel's baby."

Mme. Giry nodded. For a fleeting moment she had considered the possibility that a quick wedding to the Vicomte would solve their current problem. But Christine was right. It would not be fair. And if the child inherited Erik's features, the truth would eventually come out anyway.

"Do we have to stay here?" Christine finally asked. "Can we go away, where nobody knows us?"

Mme. Giry sighed. "You would still be unmarried, having a bastard child," she reminded Christine. "And then there is always the risk that rumors of the events surrounding the fire at the Opéra might follow us. Your last name is so uncommon, people would start suspecting... if you want to find work ever again, and with a baby to support you would have to find employment..."

"I know the world will not recognize it, but I do consider myself married to my angel," Christine whispered. "The only thing missing was a priest's blessing, but I think God has blessed our union nevertheless. I was wearing my wedding dress, my angel gave me the ring, and I promised to be his for ever and always. Those were my vows. It was a wedding of some kind. And I will remain faithful."

"I understand what you mean," Mme. Giry comforted the young woman. "And I am not thinking less of you – or Erik – for what happened. I am just trying to find the best way to protect you and Erik's child."

Christine nodded. She knew that Mme. Giry had a point. The world would not be kind to her and her fatherless child. Yet, she hoped with all her heart that Mme. Giry was right and that she was indeed pregnant. A baby! Created in love by her and her angel! Just the thought of it made her smile.

She suddenly had an idea. "What if I changed my name?" she suggested. "So many artists use a stage name. Nobody would know me then, if I went away, and nobody would know that I have never been married and am not really a widow."

Mme. Giry thought about it for a while. A new identity... that might work. Christine would need documents, though, a passport and such, and those would be hard to get.

"Without proper papers...," she voiced her concern. "And what would you want to call yourself anyway?"

Christine smiled. "My mother's maiden name," she suggested. "Katrina Almgren. Widow of Erik Almgren. Swedish national. How does that sound?"


	7. Beginnings

SORRY! I am sooooo sorry! I hoped I would be able to get a chapter done last week, but things were crazy around here and I did not managed to write more than a few paragraphs. I promise to update more regularly in the future, or to at least warn you, when longer periods of non-posting can be anticipated.

On a different note, THANK YOU all for reading, reviewing, putting on alert or adding to favorites! I hope you will still stick with me, despite this unusually looong wait for the next chapter. I love you all, and I do take suggestions and criticism seriously. I know now that you wish for a story where they are not separated for too long. Well, this story is planned out and I know what is going to happen, but I certainly will keep that in mind once I am looking for my next storyline. I am not promising anything, but I will definitely remember that point!

Anyway, here it is, the long awaited next chapter. I still don't own anything or anybody... but you didn't really think I did, right?

Chapter 7 – Beginnings

Mme. Giry sighed. "Let me give this some thought," she finally told Christine. "You get some rest. If we are right, then you have to think about the little one and take extra good care of yourself."

Christine nodded dreamily. "A baby," she whispered. "Erik may have left me a little angel..." And she vowed to do her best to stay strong and healthy for the sake of her child.

A few more days passed, and neither did Christine's monthly flow set in, nor did her queasiness in the mornings stop. There was practically no doubt anymore that she was indeed expecting. Even though it would be a while before Christine would start showing, Mme. Giry began planning their move away from Paris. Christine wanted to leave France altogether, and Mme. Giry had to admit that chances of their secret being discovered would be slimmer abroad. The main problem with that plan, though, was getting valid documents for Christine under her assumed identity.

The three ladies were once again sitting together, racking their brains, when Christine suddenly asked hesitantly, "do you think Raoul could help?"

The two Girys stared at her in shock. "You would ask him of all people to help you start a new life?" Meg asked. "Isn't he one of the reasons you want to get away from here?"

Christine blushed. "I know it's stupid," she admitted, "but we were friends once and maybe as a friend he could understand that I need to get away from a place were everything reminds me of my angel. And if we tell him that I want to pass myself off as a mourning widow in order to avoid unwanted male attention..."

Mme. Giry gave her a doubtful look. "You broke the engagement with him," she reminded Christine. "He may therefore not be willing to help us, since you hurt his pride. And I am not sure if I would want him to guess the real reason for your planned change of name."

The three ladies discussed the pros and cons of involving the Vicomte for a while longer, but since neither of them knew of anybody else of similar status and influence that they could have approached with their request, Mme. Giry finally decided that the young nobleman was their best hope and that they would have to risk asking him for help.

Xxxx

The following morning, Raoul de Chagny was more than just a bit surprised to receive a short note from his – what was she now to him? Fiancée, former fiancée, childhood friend? - anyway, from Christine, asking him to see her "as a friend, in order to discuss something important". He frowned, rereading the note for the third time at least. He had not heard from Christine since the ill-fated opening night of "Don Juan Triumphant" and he was a little annoyed that she had ignored him those past two and a half weeks. Why was she now suddenly asking to see him? What could she possibly want? Was she finally coming to her senses and trying to get on his good side again? Maybe she was even willing to honor their engagement and discuss a wedding date?

Raoul bit his lip. He would of course forgive her eventually and take her back, but he would not make it too easy for Christine. She deserved some punishment for the way she had ignored him since that night. Let her beg for his forgiveness for a while, then generously accept her apology and reinstate her as his fiancée, that's what he would do. Then his eyes fell on the note she had sent him and rested on the words "as a friend". What if he was wrong and Christine was not planning to return to him? What if she truly only saw him as a friend now? No, that was inconceivable. Christine would certainly want him back. She had had enough time to think things over and must have come to the conclusion that marrying him was her best option, especially with the Opéra Populaire burnt down and as a consequence her being unemployed at the moment. She had probably just chosen those words to make it less obvious, less embarrassing to grovel at his feet like that, begging him to forgive her and take her back.

Raoul was therefore in a good mood, looking forward to his reconciliation with Christine, when he set out to meet her at Mme. Giry's home later that day. How grateful she would be that he was willing to forgive her idiotic fantasy of being engaged to that – thing! How relieved that he would be paying her bills from now on! How lovingly she would thank him, how sweet her kisses would taste...

His shock could therefore not have been greater when he arrived at the Giry-home and was lead into the parlor by Meg, where Christine, suitably chaperoned by Mme. Giry, awaited him. He almost failed to recognize his former fiancée. Christine was only a shadow of her former self. She had definitely lost weight, her pale features were drawn and haggard, and the black dress she wore made her look even paler, almost as white as the wall behind her. The only part of her that showed some life were her eyes, those huge, dark brown orbs that seemed to burn with a strange fire.

Raoul was appalled to see Christine like that. What had happened to his beautiful fiancée in such a short time? He was still trying to think of something to say when her weak voice interrupted his thoughts.

"Thank you for coming," Christine said softly. "I know it is preposterous of me to ask for your help after I hurt you so much, but there simply is no one else I could think of..." Her voice trailed as she glanced at her childhood friend, trying to determine whether or not he might be willing to procure the necessary documents for her.

Raoul gave her his most charming smile. "Of course, Lotte, I understand that you were agitated and not thinking things through. You don't have to worry, though. I have been waiting for you to send for me, to tell me that it was all a mistake, that you are of course willing to marry me..."

Christine shook her head. "Oh Raoul, no," she protested. "That's not at all why I asked you to see me." She hesitated. What she had to tell him would cause him pain and hurt his pride, but it needed to be said nevertheless. "I cannot marry you," she whispered. "I know that now. I do not love you the way a wife should love her husband."

Raoul laughed. It sounded forced and it was obvious that he was hurt. "But him you would have married?" he asked. "A murderer? A disfigured freak? You really would have preferred him over me?"

Christine sighed. "He was a warm and caring individual," she explained. "He took me under his wings when my dear papa left me, he was there for me when I thought I would die of loneliness and sorrow. And he taught me to sing, he developed my voice and gave me my career. He understood me like nobody else, and he was always there for me. He was the one I loved, and I will love him till the day I die. He was my fiancé, and I will remain faithful to him."

Raoul stared at her. "You can't be serious," he commented, shaking his head. "Are you telling me that you are planning to play the mourning widow of that monster? Surely you must see that you would ruin your reputation and make people doubt your sanity by doing so?"

"That's why I need to go away," Christine explained. "I need to leave Paris, where everybody knows me and start a new life elsewhere. I also need a new name, so that I can really start anew, without fear of rumors of my past catching up with me."

"You want to go away?" Raoul asked incredulously. "Why? What for? And change your name?" It was obvious from his tone of voice that he thought Christine had completely lost her mind.

"I do not want to stay here, where everything reminds me of my angel," Christine tried again to explain. "And since I consider myself my angel's bride, I want the chance to mourn him properly. The widow's clothes will also keep unwanted male attention at bay. Of course if I go as Christine Daaé, wherever I go, people might have heard about what happened here, and then they will know that I am not really a widow and things might get a bit awkward, as you have pointed out. If I can use a different name, though, chances are that people in my new place of residence will never find out about my past and I will be left alone. I may even be able to sing again later..."

"That plan is complete madness!" Raoul exclaimed. "Where will you go? How will you support yourself? How will you survive without male protection?"

Christine was about to answer, when she felt Mme. Giry's comforting hand on her arm. "I do not think it is necessary for you to know where Christine will be going," Mme. Giry informed the Vicomte. "In fact, the fewer people know about her whereabouts, the less likely her true identity will be discovered. Also, we all have some savings that will help us get over the first time in a new town, and once we are settled there, we will be able to look for jobs. Christine may not have a male relative or husband to protect her, but she will not be alone. Meg and I will go with her, you need not worry. Now, are you going to do as she asked you and help her get the necessary documents so that she can assume a new identity?"

Christine looked at Raoul with those strange, burning eyes. "Please," she begged. "If you ever loved me, if you still remember our friendship from years ago, I beg you to get me those documents."

Raoul had to look away. He could not face the painful look at the bottom of those eyes that had once looked up to him with trusting adoration. "You will not reconsider?" he asked harshly. "You could still marry me and stay here..."

Christine sighed. "I need to go away, Raoul," she repeated. "I need to get away from this city that reminds me of my lost love and of my crime against the man who had watched over me, guided and protected me since I was seven years old. By playing my part in your scheme to catch him, I have become an accomplice, I am in a way responsible for what has happened to him. Marrying you is therefore out of the question. It would be like dancing on his..." She fought back tears at the thought that her angel had no grave, that he was forever buried underneath the ruins of the Opéra Populaire.

Raoul groaned. "It was all in vain," he spat out. "I wanted to free you from this criminal, but it seems his hold over you is unbreakable, even now that he is dead."

"Raoul remember our friendship as children," Christine begged. "Don't tarnish my memories of those happy days now. Be the friend that you used to be, help me honor my vows to the man whose death we both caused."

Raoul looked away. She was irresistible in her pleading, the way her eyes were glistering with unshed tears, her weak voice, her pale, pale features... Was it possible that she truly had loved that thing? That he had brought suffering upon her by fighting this evil monster's influence on her?

"Please," Christine repeated. "If you want me to remember you as a friend, if you want me to forgive you for enlisting my help..." She desperately fought for her composure. She felt like crying out in frustration. Raoul did not seem to listen. He was probably not going to help her. How could she now get documents that would allow her to leave Paris and live in peace with her baby, as a widow, who was remaining faithful to her dead husband even beyond the grave?

Raoul faced her again. "If I do it," he asked, "hypothetically, if I help you – will I ever see you again?"

Christine shook her head. "Probably not," she admitted. "It will be better that way. But I would be able to remember you fondly and to think of you as a friend..."

"And otherwise..." Raoul was beginning to give in. He knew she had a point. If he was honest, it had been jealousy much more than true concern for her well-being what had motivated him to fight the Phantom, and a tiny voice reminded him that Christine would probably never have accepted his advances if her so-called angel had not killed Buquet, a killing, which as he now knew, might well have been an act of self-defense.

"Please Raoul, let us not consider that possibility," Christine whispered. "Please, be the boy again that I once admired, the strong, gentle, generous boy, willing to help those in need. The one, who stormed into the cold sea to retrieve my lost scarf..."

Raoul sighed. "This is the end, then," he stated sadly. "I wanted to give you the moon and the stars, and all you want is a document with a false name on it..."

"It may be the end of me being in your life," Christine comforted him, "but not the end of our friendship. Please Raoul, I have lost so much already. Let me not lose your friendship as well. Let me go away graciously, set me free..."

Raoul felt tears well in his own eyes at her passionate plea. "I will do it," he promised finally, his voice on the verge of breaking. "Tell me the name you want to use and I will see to it that you get those documents."

Christine beamed at him. "Thank you," she said softly. "You are a true friend. I want to use the name Katrina Almgren, which was my mother's maiden name. Please let the documents read that I am the widow of one Erik Almgren, and a Swedish national."

Raoul gave her a quizzical look. "Erik?" he asked.

Christine shrugged. "The name is common in Scandinavia," she explained.

Raoul nodded. "It will take a few days," he stated, "but in about a week you should have your new passport and assorted other documents."

Ten days later, the Girys and a Mme. Katrina Almgren left Paris, heading south.

Xxxx

Nadir Khan and his loyal servant Darius were close to exhaustion. Against their initial expectations that the Phantom would not survive another day, Erik seemed to cling to life. His condition remained unchanged, though, for weeks and weeks on end his body was ravaged by a high fever. Their patient went from delirious to completely apathetic, but in over a month he never once regained consciousness. He lost weight, and seemed to grow even weaker – if that was possible, considering his condition when they had found him – but something kept him alive. It was as if he simply refused to die.

The two Persians took turns watching over their injured friend, caring for him round the clock, even though nothing they did seemed to yield a positive result. Nadir was beginning to fear that Erik would never wake up again, that their friend would remain in a limbo, hanging between life and death indefinitely. But he never stopped his ministrations, he changed the bandages, brewed his oriental medicines to keep Erik's fever down and put damp cloths on the Phantom's burning hot forehead.

Five weeks had passed that way, and both Nadir and Darius knew that they would not be able to go on like that much longer. The constant night watches at their patient's bedside were beginning to take their toll on them. Sooner or later they would collapse, and once they were not able to provide Erik with that kind of intensive care any longer, he would die. They knew the day was approaching fast when they would have to accept that their efforts had been in vain and that nothing would bring Erik back from the brink of death.

It was at the end of a long night, Nadir was sitting with Erik. He had been putting cool, damp cloths on Erik's forehead for hours, when he finally dozed off, overcome by exhaustion. He could not have slept long, in fact, he thought he was still dreaming, when a faint voice called his name. He smiled as he remembered that dream, leaned back into the chair, closing his eyes again, when he heard the voice again.

"Nadir!"

Nadir was suddenly wide awake. He had not been dreaming or imagining things after all. Somebody had indeed called his name. Somebody, whose eyes were open for the first time in weeks,and who looked at him in recognition.

"Erik!" Nadir's voice wavered. Too sudden and unexpected was this improvement of his friend's condition. "You are awake!"

Erik nodded weakly. "Christine," he murmured. "Safe?"

Nadir had no idea why his friend would worry about that stupid prima donna, who had stomped on his heart, but he knew for sure that she had survived the fire at the opera house unharmed. "She is fine," he said therefore, squeezing Erik's hand reassuringly. "But you must rest now. Don't speak too much. I will ask Darius to get some broth for you, you must regain your strength. Everything else can wait."

"Safe," Erik murmured, relieved. He felt incredibly tired. He closed his eyes again and dozed off. When he awoke again a few hours later, a bowl of hot chicken broth was ready and with Nadir's help he managed to swallow a few spoonfuls of it, before he dozed off again. The next two weeks, Erik slept most of the time, and only woke up for brief moments to ingest some nourishment. He was far from out of the woods, but for the first time since the fire, Nadir and Darius began to hope that he might actually pull through.


	8. News

Hi everybody, thank you so much for your kind reviews! I could not do it without you. And yes, I know, it will take a little while till they are reunited, but keep in mind, the family will be together at one point, and think about Erik's surprise when he learns about Christine's reason for leaving! ;-)

Anyway, thanks to each and everybody who reads this story, has added it to favorites, put it on alert or written a review or two! You always make my day, when I get an email informing me of one of these!

My other story will hopefully be updated tomorrow, Monday at the latest, just for those of you that follow WWSG as well.

I do not own anything or anybody... not even the baby, since Kay already gave them one... :-(

Chapter 8 – News

A few weeks later Erik finally was strong enough that he stayed awake for more than a few minutes at a time. So, once he had finished his bowl of stewed vegetables that Darius had prepared for him, he leaned back into his pillows and softly asked Nadir, "Christine? Where is she? Why is she not here with me?"

Nadir was confused. "Christine? Why would you expect her to be here?" he asked hesitantly. "Didn't you tell me she was going to marry that patron of the Opéra, de Chagny, I think his name was?" Nadir paused. He had not thought about it previously, but now that Erik had brought up that woman, he found it strange that there had not been any news about her wedding yet. Considering the fact that she had lost her livelihood when the Opéra burned down, wouldn't it have been logical for her fiancé to marry her as soon as possible so that he could provide for her?

Erik shook his head, smiling broadly at the memory of what had happened between him and Christine while above them the Opéra had been burning down and a mob had been looking for him. "She wears _my_ ring, daroga," he informed Nadir, "and it is _me_ she loves. We are getting married. So where is she? Why is she not here with me? You said she was fine?" Erik became agitated. "Was that a lie? Did you just tell me she was fine to keep me calm? What is wrong here?"

Nadir grabbed Erik's shoulder to calm his friend. "Erik, are you sure?" he asked. "This is not one of your many fever-induced hallucinations? You are honestly convinced that Mlle. Daaé loves you and wants to marry you?" As inconceivable as that idea seemed to Nadir, considering the events that had lead up to the fire at the Opéra Populaire and Erik's injuries, at least it would explain why she had not married that young patron yet.

Erik frowned. For a moment he doubted. Had these things really happened? Had Christine truly allowed him to make love to her and told him that she loved him or were his "memories" just wishful thinking? Then he grinned. No, this had been no dream. The memories of their time together were too vivid, and no dream or hallucination could ever cause that feeling of completeness, of acceptance, of... happiness, that now filled his whole being at the thought of Christine.

"She does love me," Erik repeated. "I told her to wait for me at Mme. Giry's..." He paused. "Is that where she is?" he then asked. Of course! How could he have been so stupid! She certainly could not stay with Nadir and help him care for Erik. That would only draw unnecessary attention to Erik's whereabouts, as well as ruin her reputation.

Nadir hesitated. Erik seemed so convinced that the young soprano was waiting for him, but how likely was that? After all, she had not seemed to care much for her former "Angel" once she had learned about Erik's trued identity. It was becoming obvious, though, that he would have to investigate, find out more about Mlle. Daaé's current situation. He also knew the time had come when he would finally have to contact Mme. Giry. First, because Erik was obviously going to make it now, and that woman deserved to know that her friend and foster brother was still alive, and second, because she was probably able to shed some light on Mlle. Daaé and her feelings for Erik, the Vicomte or both.

Nadir suddenly felt uneasy. Had it been a mistake not to inform Mme. Giry immediately after they had found Erik? What if Erik was right and Christine had promised to marry him after all – for whatever reason? Wouldn't she consider herself free of that promise, considering that the Phantom had officially been declared dead? Was she maybe just waiting until a suitable period of mourning had passed before marrying the Vicomte? What if by leaving her in the dark about Erik's survival he had destroyed the latter's chance at finding happiness with her?

No, Nadir shook his head. Christine was not married to de Chagny yet, that he was certain of. It was therefore not too late yet. For, if she truly did love Erik, she would be overjoyed to hear he was alive and recovering and they would find a way to allow her and Erik to start a new life together somewhere, and if she did not love his disfigured friend, then it was better for both of them if she moved on, thinking him dead, for then she could not bring Erik true happiness, even if she kept her promise and married him.

"I guess Mlle. Daaé is with Mme. Giry," Nadir therefore hesitantly told Erik, and when he saw how his friend still fretted, unable to calm down, he added, "I will pay the good Madame a visit later and see if I can find out more about your former student's whereabouts." He stressed the words "former student" somewhat, thus making it clear that he was not too convinced of Erik's claim to be loved by the young diva.

Erik stared at Nadir. "You do not know for sure?" he asked. "Have you not been in contact with Antoinette? Does she not know that I am here with you?" Erik got even more agitated, as realization finally hit him. "They do not know that I am here," he repeated defeatedly. "What do they think then where I am? Do they believe...? No!" Erik screamed in desperation.

"You let them believe I was dead! They think I am gone! How long...?" Erik realized that he had lost complete track of time. How long had he been unconscious and in the throes of fever? A week, two? No, it must have been longer, for it had been mid-February, late winter, when the Vicomte had tried to ambush him during the opening performance of "Don Juan Triumphant", and now... Erik could hear the birds singing outside, and the old tree in the backyard of Nadir's apartment building that he could see from his window, was full of new, fresh green leaves.

"Two months," Nadir admitted. "It has been close to two months since... you got injured. But," he tried to explain his actions, "your condition was critical for the majority of this time. I could not be sure if you would survive. I did think about contacting Mme. Giry, since I know she considers you a friend, or almost family, but, Erik, you must understand, you were so weak, I did not think you would pull through, and so... I thought it would be cruel to tell her you were alive, to get her hopes up, only to have you die on us a few days later after all. I did not want to do this to her. I wanted to wait till I could be sure of your survival..."

Erik groaned. Two months! Two months of Christine and Antoinette thinking him dead. How would that have affected them? Were they mourning him? Was Christine still faithful? Or was she considering settling for second-best and marrying that... that fop after all? Or was she devastated at the thought of having lost him? A smile played across Erik's thin lips at the thought of how news of his survival might cheer her up. His Christine! How could he doubt her feelings for him after having experienced utter bliss in her arms, after having been one with her in the most intimate way a couple could be together? He thought of the way she had looked at him after their love-making, the way her eyes had sparkled when she had finally realized that her heart had been his all along. Oh, how relieved she would be to learn that he was still alive, just barely, but alive after all, and on the way to recovery.

"Go at once," Erik told Nadir. "Don't waste one single moment. Go to Antoinette and tell her and Christine that I am alive. What must they have suffered, thinking me dead! How could you let them believe that for so long! My poor Christine, my sweet angel, how she must have cried at the news of my death! And Antoinette as well. She does care for me, and is like a sister to me. Go and dry their tears! Go!"

Nadir hesitated for a moment. He was not sure he could leave Erik when the latter was so agitated. "I will go," he stated, trying to appease Erik. "But you must promise me to relax. The ladies would not want me to let you fret so much. You calm down, and I promise I'll talk to them immediately."

"Go!" Erik groaned again. "How can you expect me to be calm, when my fiancée and my foster sister have thought me dead for two months! Go, and bring them to me!"

Nadir nodded, and hurriedly left the room. After having asked Darius to keep an eye on their patient, he went to see Mme. Giry.

Xxx

About fifteen minutes later Nadir arrived at the address Erik had given him a long time ago, the one where he could supposedly reach the ballet mistress should he ever need to convey a message to her from Erik. When he approached the house he began to doubt, though, that he was indeed in the right place. The building seemed abandoned even from a distance, and when he got closer, he noticed that it was not just the windows that were closed, but the blinds too. The door was locked and nobody answered, when he rang the doorbell.

"Interested in buying the house?" A deep voice interrupted Nadir's thoughts. "I am afraid, you won't be able to get in and have a look around. You need an appointment with the estate agent for that, but I can assure you that it's in good condition, has not been abandoned for long yet. Can't be more than maybe two to three weeks or so since the lady moved out."

"I was looking for an acquaintance," Nadir informed the stranger facing him, making it sound as if he were a tourist passing through Paris. "I was under the impression that she lived here. That is, the lady in question is related to a friend of mine who suggested I visit her while in Paris and convey his greetings. A Madame Antonia Miry?"

The friendly stranger laughed. "Giry, that's what the former owner was called, but I think her first name was Antoinette, but then, that's just another form of Antonia, right? Well, since she moved so recently, your friend may not have known about her change of address yet. Pity, you won't be able to give her his regards."

Nadir nodded, looking dignified. "I suppose you are right," he replied. "Unless, that is, you might be able to supply her new address?"

The stranger shook his head. "No, I am afraid, I don't know where she went with the girls. I doubt though, you would be able to go see her, even if I did. I had the impression they were leaving the city, going far away. The young aristocrat, who had been courting the soprano..." The talkative man interrupted himself. "Well, you probably have no clue what I am talking about, but one of the girls, I guess you could call her the foster daughter, she had been a diva at the Opéra Populaire, before it burnt down roughly two months ago. She was engaged to a nobleman, a patron of the Opéra, but she was also involved in some scandal there. Some think that she may have even had something to do with the fire. There was a madman there, who tried to force her to love him, he died in the fire but still... I guess her reputation was tainted..."

The stranger met with Nadir's disapproving stare. "Not that I would know any details about this," he quickly added, "and far be it from me to cast any doubts on the Mademoiselle's conduct, she certainly always seemed to be a proper young lady, but something must have happened that prevented her planned marriage to that Vicomte, for I saw her leaving with Mme. Giry and her daughter. The Vicomte was there to see them off. He seemed sad, and I heard him say something like 'If you ever need help..' It was early in the mourning, at dawn, the ladies were all wearing dark dresses, the atmosphere was depressing. And she said something like 'Thank you, you will always be my friend', that's why I guess they had to break off the engagement because her reputation had suffered. They were both very sad, especially the young lady, but then, things would weigh heavier on her, wouldn't they?"

Nadir nodded. "You may be right, Monsieur," he commented. "Thank you for your information. I guess I will have to tell my friend then that his relative moved without leaving her new address."

He took his leave of the stranger and started his way back. He was not sure what to make of the news he had just received. Why would Mme. Giry suddenly leave Paris with Christine and her daughter? Obviously Christine was not going to marry the Vicomte anytime soon, but why? Was it because her reputation was tainted and a union between her and the young nobleman had therefore become impossible, as the stranger, presumably a neighbor, had suspected? Or was it true that she loved Erik, as his friend was convinced, and had it been her to call off the engagement? He had a feeling that only Christine knew the answer to that – and unfortunately, she was out of reach and it was impossible to contact her. For a moment Nadir considered approaching the Vicomte in order to find out where Christine had gone, but then decided against it. No, the Vicomte could only be an absolutely last resort. What would de Chagny think if a stranger he had never met before suddenly asked him about his former fiancée? Wouldn't he find this suspicious? The last thing Nadir wanted, was to make the world find out that Erik was still alive – or to at least have doubts about the former Phantom's supposed death at the hands of the mob. No, it was safer for Erik if the Phantom's death remained undisputed.

But what was he to tell his young friend? He groaned inwardly at the thought of having to confess to Erik that he had come too late, that the ladies had left Paris a few weeks ago, apparently still believing him to be dead. How would Erik take these news? Nadir had a feeling that this information would not be too well received by his still recovering friend. "If only he won't suffer a relapse," Nadir thought. "Oh Allah, I am sure you have kept him alive for a reason. Please protect him now, help him deal with this blow. That man has suffered so much already, if it is true that this young soprano cares for him after all, help them. Let us find a way to locate her, to reunite them." But despite his unwavering faith in his God and his conviction that Allah would guide his words, Nadir still had a feeling that having to tell Erik the truth about Christine's and the Girys' disappearance might turn out to be among the hardest hours of his entire life.

Xxxx

When Nadir finally arrived home, a nervous Darius greeted him. "Allah be praised that you are finally home, master," the loyal servant told him. "Master Erik is extremely agitated, I do not know how to calm him down, and I am sure this will have negative effects on his recovery."

Nadir sighed. "I fear I won't be able to make him relax," he mumbled, slowly making his way to the guest room, where Erik was impatiently waiting for his return.

The moment he entered, Nadir was bombarded with questions. "Did you see her? What did she say? Was she very upset that you did not tell her sooner that I am alive? How is she? Did she miss me?" And finally, "when will I see her?"

Nadir raised an arm in a defensive gesture. "Stop it, Erik," he begged. "I will tell you everything, but please promise me to relax..."

Erik's eyes widened and he paled visibly. He had caught up on the Persian's hesitant tone. "There is a problem," he whispered, defeatedly. "Is she.. does she... the Vicomte?"

Nadir shook his head. "No," he stated flatly. "No, she definitely is not with the Vicomte, but... I do not know where she is. Or your friend Antoinette and her daughter, for that matter. The house is deserted and up for sale, and a neighbor told me the ladies left a few weeks ago. He was convinced they were leaving the city altogether, and he was positive that the Vicomte was seeing them off and that it seemed as if it was a farewell forever between him and Mlle. Daaé."

"Why?" Erik gasped. "Why would they leave Paris?"

Nadir shrugged. "I don't know what to tell you, Erik," he confessed. "Maybe they wanted to get away from here, forget everything that has happened, start a new life somewhere else..." He somehow did not have the heart to tell Erik that Christine's reputation might have suffered due to the events Erik had caused at the Opéra and that therefore she could not bear the thought of living in this city where people doubted her virtue.

"The Vicomte was not going with them?" Erik asked again. "Are you sure, she left alone?"

"As far as I know, the ladies left alone," Nadir confirmed. "And I am fairly certain there was a mention in the papers of the Vicomte having attended the opening of an art show somewhere earlier this week, so I guess we can safely assume that he is still in Paris."

"She probably left because she thought me dead," Erik groaned. "She could not live here anymore after losing me..." His poor Christine, his angel, the woman who had given not only her heart, but also her body to him, how must she have suffered to learn of his supposed demise! That she apparently had broken off her engagement to the Vicomte despite the fact that his own reported death had freed her of the engagement to him filled Erik with joy. It was good to know that their encounter had meant enough to her to not settle for second-best and remain faithful. Or... Erik shuddered. Or had she not been able to marry the Vicomte because of... "Because of what I did to her," he thought. "I might have ruined her chances of marrying a good man, and now that she is gone and it is doubtful that I will ever find her again..."

"We must find her," Erik screamed. "I need to know what is going on, why she left, why she did not marry the Vicomte, even though she thought me dead, I need to know if she is faithful because she wants to or because she has no other option and the Vicomte did not want her anymore..."

"We will look for her," Nadir agreed, "but first you need to recover, to get strong again. You won't be able to follow her, to search for her, if you remain as weak and bedridden as you are now." He rummaged through a drawer in the nightstand and produced a white powder which he dissolved in a glass of water. "You need to relax in order to get better. Drink this now. I promise I will help you locate her, even now, while you are still sick, I will try to get information on her possible whereabouts, but you must cooperate and do your best to get well as quickly as possible."

Erik sighed. He knew Nadir was right. In his current condition he would not be able to find Christine. Their reunion would have to wait. "I will do as you suggest," he finally relented, "since it makes sense that I need to get well first. Then we can search the world for my Christine. I will not rest until I have found her again and will hold her in my arms again."


	9. Little angel

Sorry for the late update! I never seem to be able to make time for updating two stories per week. :-( Thank you very much to everybody who is still hanging in there and reading despite my infrequent updates, and a very special thank you to my lovely reviewers and everybody who has put this story on alert or added it to their favorites. You all make my day!

Anyway, on with the story. This is an important chapter, since we are about to meet a new character, who will play a pivotal role in what is to come. And yeah, I know, you are aware of it, but just to make sure everybody understands, I still do not own anything or anybody, and I probably never will. Sigh!

Chapter 9 – Little angel

Mme. Giry and the two young ladies travelled south. Because of Christine's condition they were making frequent stops so that the journey would not be too exhausting for the young mother-to-be. They had decided to go to Italy, where they hoped to eventually find employment at one of the many smaller opera houses. Italy also appealed to them since they all knew a few phrases of Italian from various operas that had been performed in that language at the Populaire and they were therefore confident that they would be able to make themselves understood.

Due to their leisurely travel speed, Christine was already beginning to show when they finally passed the border and reached what would be their new home country. The ladies decided to stay in Turin, at least until Christine's baby had been born. Mme. Giry and Meg knew that the thought of the baby was what kept Christine going. They therefore wanted to make sure that the young woman could get plenty of rest during the last months of her pregnancy, to avoid anything which could possibly lead to a miscarriage.

Christine was in a strange mood. She was at the same time utterly devastated about having lost Erik and totally enthusiastic at the thought of the tiny human being growing inside her, the token of her and Erik's love. She could sit for hours, a hand on her bulging belly, silently talking to her unborn child, telling her baby what a wonderful person its father was, and what a pity it was that her little angel would never be able to meet him.

"My Erik would love you so much," she murmured to her belly. "He was too good for this world, now he is a true angel. He had no obligations whatsoever to take care of me when he found me weeping for my dead papa in that chapel, all those years ago, but he did. He understood what I was going through and helped me deal with my loss. He showered me with love, he told me all that I know, he..." Tears began to form in the corners of her eyes. "I wish he could be here with us now," she continued softly. "That he could actually be there, when you will finally be born, that he could see you, hold you, that the two of you could meet." She sighed, looking up to the sky. "You will see our child, Angel, won't you?" she sobbed. "You will watch over both of us from above, just as you always watched over me at the Opéra Populaire. You and papa... you will be with us, always. Your love will protect us..."

Xxxx

The three ladies had rented a small house in the suburbs of Turin. As soon as they had settled in, Mme. Giry had contacted a midwife that had been recommended to her by their landlady and asked her to have a look at Christine. "It is such a tragic situation," she explained to the midwife. "My foster-daughter was only married for a few weeks, when her husband died in an accident. She was very much in love with him, and to lose him in such a way..." She paused for emphasis. "We were almost fearing for her sanity, and if she had not found out at about the same time that she was with child,..."

The midwife nodded in understanding. She was an elderly woman and had delivered hundreds of babies in her life. She had met a few widows before, who had given birth a few months after their husband's death, and she knew about the problems involved. After examining Christine, she took Mme. Giry aside. "Physically Madame Almgren is fine," she told her. "Everything is as it should be, and I do not foresee any problems during the remainder of her pregnancy or during delivery of the baby. What I do fear, though, is that she might be too emotionally attached to her child, that she will suffocate the little one with her love for both, the child and its father. She might be overprotective, constantly afraid of losing the child as well. Should that happen, you must make sure she understands that such an approach could harm the development of her offspring."

Mme. Giry sighed. "I understand what you mean," she told the midwife, "and I will try to help her not to make that particular mistake. It is just... she loved Erik so much, and they had so little time together. She now sees the child as his final legacy..." She smiled. "But I am sure she will listen to reason when she realizes that it's not in the baby's best interest if she becomes too clingy."

Mme. Giry hesitated for a moment, before asking, "is that your only concern for the infant? You do not expect any … ill effects caused by the emotional shock the young mother went through at the early stages of her pregnancy?" What she was concerned about was that the child might have inherited Erik's face, but she did not want to directly ask about that possibility and to disclose the fact that the baby's father had been heavily disfigured.

The midwife shook her head. "No, I don't expect any problems. It is true, that sometimes such a situation can cause serious problems, but in most cases they lead to a miscarriage. After examining Mme. Almgren I can assure you, though, that everything is normal and that I have no reason to assume that the baby or Mme. Almgren have suffered any ill effects."

Mme. Giry smiled relieved. Even though she was convinced that the baby would be well loved by all three of them, even if he or she did indeed inherit Erik's face, for the child's sake she hoped it would not be cursed with its father's fate.

Xxxx

The months passed quickly. Meg had been able to find employment in the corps de ballet at the opera house in town, while Mme. Giry was working as a seamstress, a job which allowed her to stay at home with Christine most of the time.

Christine was sewing a lot, too, and knitting as well. She was preparing a wardrobe for her baby. She had never had much interest in such womanly chores, but now she began to relish them. It meant the world to her that she could already start caring for the child, even though it was still a few weeks till the little one would be born.

"Erik was always impeccably dressed," she told Mme. Giry one day. "He would want the same for our child."

Mme. Giry smiled. She had a feeling that Erik, if he were still alive, would make sure that both, Christine and their child, had the most flattering and becoming outfits. But knowing about his own miserable childhood, she was also sure that what would matter most to him would be that the child was loved.

"You will be a great mother," she simply told Christine. "That's what will mean most to Erik, when he watches you and his child from above."

Xxxx

On a rainy, cold day in November, Christine went into labor. Meg went for the midwife immediately. At her arrival the latter found her patient to be rather crestfallen. "How can I go through with this without my Angel," Christine sobbed, scared to death by the pain the first, still rather mild contractions had caused her. She wished Erik were here and could calm her with his melodious voice, hold her hand and comfort her during the whole process. Having to go through this alone was hell.

Christine grabbed Mme. Giry's hand. "What if I do not survive this?" she rasped. "For I don't think I can hold on much longer. What about my baby? What will become of my little angel?"

"Sh," Mme. Giry tried to calm her. "Relax. You will survive this. You will be able to take care of the baby and be there for your little one. I know the pain is almost unbearable. I thought I would die as well, when I had Meg. That's not unusual. Just concentrate on the joy of finally being able to hold your baby. Focus on that. The baby needs you to be strong. Erik would want you to be strong."

Christine nodded and tried to relax, but when a few minutes later another contraction hit, her fear returned. It did not help that it took hours before she was sufficiently dilated and the midwife could finally tell her to push.

Things went fast then, and two contractions later, Christine finally heard the cries of her newborn child. The midwife smiled at her. "It is a boy," she told Christine. "You have a beautiful little son."

"A boy," Christine repeated. She had known it all along. She had never really considered the possibility that her child could be a girl. In her mind her little angel was the spitting image of his father – except for the disfigurement. "Can I see him?" she asked weakly.

"In a moment," the midwife announced. "Just let me clean up the little fellow a bit."

A few minutes later, Christine finally held her son. She thought her heart would burst with love when she looked at his tiny face, still red and wrinkled from the birth process. Oh, how cute he was! How utterly adorable! To her immense joy she noticed that the baby seemed to have inherited Erik's build. Her boy was rather tall and skinny, and when he opened his eyes a bit, she felt like gazing into her Angel's expressive orbs.

"Angel," she whispered, in awe. "Can you see him? Can you see our adorable, perfect little boy? This is the most precious gift you ever gave me, and the only thing which makes me sad, is that you cannot be with us. A child needs a family, two parents. I will do my best to make sure he does not miss anything, I will have to love him twice as much to make up for the love you would shower him with if you could be with us."

Mme. Giry, who had stayed with Christine for the whole time, smiled at her. "Do you have decided on a name for your son?" she asked softly.

Christine nodded. "Erik," she said, then elaborated, "Erik Gustav."

Mme. Giry's smile broadened. "They would be honored by your choice and I am sure they are both watching over you now," she said softly, "their love is with you and the boy."

The midwife then explained to Christine how she could feed the baby and promised to stop by the next day and check on her and the infant. "Just to be on the safe side," she reassured Christine, "you should both be fine!"

She then took her leave. When Mme. Giry showed her out, the midwife finally voiced a concern. "Mme. Almgren is fine," she told Antoinette. "And I think the boy is, too, it's just... he is of average weight for a newborn baby, but he is taller than average, thus skinnier than I would like. It's probably nothing, babies vary in size and weight, it's just a bit unusual..."

Mme. Giry let out a breath she had not been aware she had been holding. She had expected some terrible information on the baby's health or rather lack thereof. The midwife's words did not make her overly concerned, though, since she had the perfect explanation for the little boy's long limbs. "I think that means he comes after his father," she informed the midwife. "Monsieur Almgren was rather tall and skinny. It seems the boy inherited his figure."

Xxxx

Once little Erik had been fed and dressed, Mme. Giry insisted for Christine to rest. Christine could not sleep, though. She was too busy watching her son sleep. Mme. Giry had put him in the cradle they had prepared for him and had pushed it right next to Christine's bed, so that the young mother could see her boy.

"He is the most beautiful child in the whole world," Christine thought. "How sad that he has to grow up without his father! I know from personal experience what it means to be fatherless, but I had my dear papa for a few years at least, my little angel will never be able to meet his." And she promised that she would tell little Erik everything about his father. "He was a genius," she whispered, "he had the most beautiful voice, and he loved me so much. I hurt him badly once, but at least I could convince him that I regretted my previous actions, that I did love him, before he..." She was sobbing now. "I still love him," she told her son, "I always will. There will never be another man in my life. I am his for all eternity. You will never have a stepfather."

Xxxx

At around the same time, the boy's father was finally sufficiently recovered that he could think about travelling. After Nadir had told him in April that Christine and the Girys had left Paris, Erik had ordered Nadir to start investigations at once, to try and find out where the ladies had gone. "Even if we cannot follow them immediately, we can contact them, once we know where they have gone," he had told his friend. "The sooner they know that I am alive and will join them shortly, wherever they are, the better. I do not want them to mourn me any longer. Just imagine how heartbroken they both must be!"

Nadir had had to admit that Erik's words made sense and had used every channel of information he had access to, to try and find out the Girys' new place of residence, but it seemed as if the three ladies had dissolved into thin air, vanished completely from the face of the Earth. There did not seem to be any records anywhere about their journey. Nobody named either Giry or Daaé had rented a room at any inn anywhere in France, or bought a train ticket, boat ticket, rented a carriage, nothing. And at the time Nadir started to make his inquiries, Christine and the Girys had already been gone for almost two weeks, and even if somebody vaguely remembered having seen three ladies that would fit their description, they could not say anymore where these ladies had gone. It became obvious very soon that it would be difficult, if not downright impossible to find the women again.

When Erik learned these news he threw a fit and ranted for hours, thus overexerting his still weak body, which lead to a relapse. Thanks to Nadir and Darius he survived the returning fever again, but it was as if all energy had left him, as if life had no meaning for him anymore. Now that he had very little hope left of ever being reunited with Christine again, Erik had no will to live. He was almost mad at his two friends for having saved his life again instead of having let him die. Nadir and Darius had to work hard to make him understand that they cared for him deeply and that even though he had lost two very important people, he was not alone. Still, Erik became rather depressed and had very little interest in anything. He never once sought solace in music, he did not touch a book, and when Nadir finally persuaded him to try a game of chess, he could not concentrate on the game at all and lost after just a few moves.

Erik's melancholy state of mind was not the only problem, though. During the attack of the mob, several of his ribs had been broken. One of them had punctured Erik's lung. The lung had healed, but it soon became obvious that due to the scar tissue, the lung's immune system had suffered and Erik was now much more susceptible to pneumonia. Thus, when the days grew shorter and winter was about to set in in Paris, Nadir decided that it would be best to take his recovering patient elsewhere.

"You need a milder climate," he told Erik, "in order for your lung to heal properly, not to mention that a change of scenery would do you a lot of good. We are therefore leaving Paris. You cannot stay here anyway, even though the Phantom has officially been declared dead. It's not safe for you here, and now that you are a bit stronger again, you cannot remain confined to an apartment indefinitely. You will see, the world will look less bleak, once you have left this city behind with all its memories, once we have reached a place where nobody knows us, where you can walk around freely."

Erik shrugged. He did not really care. After all, what difference did it make, where he lead his miserable existence? He could wallow in misery and self-pity and mourn his lost love here in Paris just as well as anywhere else. Why should he leave? He had absolutely no desire of leaving Nadir's apartment, of walking around as his friend suggested.

"We are going south," Nadir decided. "How would you like the Provence, or the Côte d'Azur? The sun is warmer there, even at this time of the year, the climate is mild, I am sure you will love it there! The landscape is beautiful with its gentle slopes, we can even live at the seaside. The whole region is so poetic, I am sure you will find your music again, down there."

Erik barely listened. He did not care, deep down he knew that his music was dead, that all inspiration had left him together with his love, his bride, his muse. The mere thought of ever touching an instrument again, of putting notes to paper, made him ill. But he also did not object, when Nadir packed their things and a few days later they left Paris in a carriage, heading south.


	10. Apart

SORRY! I am so sorry for making you all wait for so long! But there was a family reunion last weekend and I had to go out of town for that. Then I thought I might be able to write the next chapter one evening after work, but we were so busy in the office every day that I simply was too tired to do so... And the bad news is, that I am not sure I will be able to update next weekend either... :-(

But many many heartfelt thanks go to my loyal readers and reviewers, and to all of you who added this story to their favorites or put it on alert. I know I have been neglecting you all badly by not updating sooner and I hope you will be able to forgive me. I also want to extend a heartfelt welcome back to trrmo77, who has figured out why I chose that particular title for this story.

Anyway, nobody gave me the rights to POTO since my last update, but then, you didn't really expect that to happen, right? Then on to the next chapter...

Chapter 10 – Apart

If Nadir had expected Erik's mood to improve once the three of them had reached the southern regions of France, he had soon to accept that his hopes were not about to come true. If anything, Erik's depression seemed to worsen. The thought that by leaving Paris he might have moved away from whatever evidence of the ladies' whereabouts might still have been lurking in Paris, waiting for him to be detected, troubled him immensely.

"What if there was something you overlooked," he asked Nadir. "Some trace you had not found yet, one minimal chance of ever figuring out where Christine and Antoinette went. One thing we know for certain: they started their journey in Paris. It's in Paris, where the trail that will eventually lead to them must be discovered. What are we doing here? Why are we wasting time in this blasted region?"

Nadir sighed. "I told you several times already," he tried to calm Erik. "It is for your own good that we came here. Your health requires a milder climate, since your lung has not completely healed. If we had stayed in Paris, you might now be fighting off pneumonia and you'd be just as unable to inquire about your ladies as you are here. Also, Paris is not safe for you. You could not conduct investigations yourself there anyway. So it does not make much of a difference where we reside, except that here it is healthier for you. But you also know that my contacts in Paris all have my current address and will notify me at once if they learn something new about your missing friends."

"Family!" Erik wailed. "Christine is my fiancée and Antoinette is like my older sister. They are my family!"

Nadir patted Erik's back to comfort his miserable friend. "I know, Erik," he admitted. "I wish I could reunite you with them, and I hope one day you will find them again, but in the meantime you will have to make do with me and Darius. I know we are only poor substitutes for them, but... we hope that one day you will see us as family as well..."

Nadir felt sorry for his friend. He knew better than Erik how slim chances were of ever finding the three ladies again. After all, he had been the one to carry out the investigations in Paris while Erik had still been convalescent and too weak to handle things. Nadir was aware of every single avenue that had been tried, every tiniest trace that had been followed and every failure his efforts had been met with.

"A miracle," Nadir thought. "It would take a miracle to find these women again. We've done everything humanly possible to locate them. There is absolutely nothing else we could do, even if we were still in Paris, since I already left no stone unturned there. But how can I tell Erik that there is no way of finding them? How can I even think about taking that hope away from him, considering how depressed and frustrated he already is? He may figure it out eventually, but Allah, I hope this won't happen anytime soon. As long as he hopes, he will have a will to live..."

Aloud he said, "concentrate on getting better, Erik. Relax in this mild climate and the pleasant surroundings. Once your lung has improved, we will be able to travel more, to renew our efforts. I know you miss the ladies, but you must be patient. It won't do you – or them, for that matter – any good if you fret too much and make yourself ill again. The sooner you are completely recovered, the sooner we can take up investigations again."

Erik sighed exasperatedly. In a way he knew that Nadir was right, that he needed to get strong and healthy again, before he could even think of restarting exhausting and painstakingly detailed investigations. But how could he relax, knowing that Christine and Antoinette thought him dead and mourned him? For one of the things Nadir had been able to find out, was that the ladies had bought several black dresses each from the dressmaker he knew Antoinette favored. That detail had shown Erik that the thought of having lost him did indeed weigh heavily on them and had caused them enough pain that they were openly displaying their mourning by wearing black for him.

"While it is true that I miss them," Erik complained, "what is even worse is the thought that they are thinking me dead. The situation must be even harder on them, for at least I know that my bride and sister are alive – somewhere in this world. But they think that I am gone. They do not even have the tiniest spark of hope of ever seeing me again. To imagine their pain and desperation is what's killing me. That these two innocent beings should have to suffer so much unnecessary pain, these angels that care enough for the monster I am, to mourn me..."

Nadir grabbed Erik's shoulder for comfort, and trying to put more confidence in his voice than he felt and a forced smile on his face, he promised Erik, "I am sure that one day you will be reunited with the ladies. Allah has not kept you alive without a reason. I am sure he has plans for you, and I am convinced that those plans involve Madame Giry and Mademoiselle Daaé. Just be patient and have faith."

Erik shook Nadir's comforting hand off and slammed his right fist into the wall in frustration. "Your Allah does not care about me," he yelled. "Why should he? I am a monster, Nadir, have you forgotten? My miserable existence was cursed from the moment I was born. How else could you explain the fact that after years, decades of being shunned by humankind I finally find love, only to have it ripped away from me the moment I have found it? And with no hope of ever finding her again." His eyes softened somewhat. "My Christine," he whispered, "that angel that brought light into the night of loneliness that had engulfed me, my sweet Christine, who would have been able to give my life meaning, to finally fill it with love and happiness, lost to me, and, what's even worse, miserable herself! I am doomed to make those select few that care for me unhappy, to bring upon them pain and misery..."

Erik fell onto a sofa, his thin body shaking with heavy sobs. "There is no love for a monster," he wailed. "I do not deserve happiness, freaks have no right to be loved, and if anybody dares to ignore that basic rule of the universe, and has the courage to get close to the likes of me and care for an anomaly, then they are severely punished by whatever force reigns this world."

Erik cried and screamed for hours until his throat was soar and he could barely croak anymore. Nothing Nadir or Darius said or did could calm him. The next day he was somewhat composed, but listless and apathetic, just sitting in a corner and staring ahead.

Nadir and Darius were greatly worried about their charge. Even though Erik was physically more or less recovered, except for the slight problems with his lung, they began to fear for his emotional and psychological well-being. Nadir knew that Erik had already been under a lot of emotional pressure the weeks before the premiere of "Don Juan Triumphant", that he had been verging on insanity for months. Then apparently he had won Christine's heart after all, the pressure had been lifted off his shoulders for a brief moment of happiness, only to crush him even more severely under its weight when he was injured and declared dead, and as a consequence Christine had left Paris.

Weeks turned into months, and after a while Erik seemed to accept the inevitable. He became a bit more relaxed, did not throw hysteric fits anymore, but he was engulfed in a deep sadness. He was intelligent enough to realize that Nadir had tried everything and then some in order to find a trace of the three ladies, and that, since none of these efforts had yielded any results, it was likely that he would never be able to see them again. Erik's brain knew that fact, but Erik's heart quivered and bled at that thought and his mind tortured him with images of Christine, Antoinette and Meg wandering the world alone, without protection, surrounded by a thousand dangers, suffering, mourning him, feeling as lost and helpless without him as he did without them, as homeless and uprooted as him, like a leave that was being carried away on the harsh winds of autumn.

Xxxx

Mme. Giry had hoped that Christine's mood would brighten, once little Erik was born, but while a certain quiet happiness radiated from the young mother, Christine's overall frame of mind remained sombre and subdued. She spent most of her time caring for her son or watching him sleep peacefully. Mme. Giry knew that Christine often talked to her baby, telling her little angel in soft tones, what a wonderful person his father was, his father, who had been her Angel, who had cared for her, taught her to sing and loved her more than she could ever tell, so much so that he had forgiven her cruel betrayal and made her the happiest woman on earth when they had given in to their love and created their wonderful little son.

"You were conceived in love and happiness, Erik," Christine murmured to her son. "You were meant to be a beacon of light in your father's bleak existence, a happy, loved child. But you were born into sorrow, to a mother, whose life has lost all joy, into the darkness of despair and loneliness, a fatherless child. I am trying hard to be a good parent to you, but without your father, without my dear, dear Angel, I am lost myself. My life has no direction anymore, and if it were not for you, my little darling, I would have followed your father..."

Mme. Giry waited a few weeks, until Christine had fully recovered from giving birth to little Erik Gustave and regained her strength. Then, when it became obvious that the baby was growing and developing just fine, Mme. Giry one day approached Christine with the question if she had thought about finding employment again.

Christine's eyes widened in shock. "You mean I must abandon my little sweetheart, all I have left of my Angel, for hours on end to work for uncaring people, to maybe leave my little angel in the hands of strangers that do not love him as I do, in order to earn money?"

Mme. Giry gave her an encouraging smile. "Well, we certainly could use an extra salary, especially now that we are a four-person household. Once you have weaned off the boy he will need food just like the rest of us, and children grow quickly, which means he will need new clothes every few weeks. Later on, once he goes to school, he will require books and such." When she saw Christine's crestfallen face, she added softly. "I know what it means to go to work when one has a small child at home, after all, my Jules died shortly after Meg was born, too, and I had to work in order to support myself and my daughter. But it does not necessarily mean you have to abandon our little Erik. You may be able to work from home, the way I do, or your employer may allow you to bring the baby, or, if push comes to shove, you can leave him with me. You know that I love him, too, and I do have some experience with babies, even though it's been a while since Meg was that small."

Christine smiled her quiet, sad smile, before asking, "what kind of work do you have in mind for me? I am not sure I would be able to find a job. All I ever knew was singing, but without my Angel..." her voice trailed as Christine unsuccessfully tried to suppress the tears that were forming in the corners of her eyes.

Mme. Giry sighed. She knew that Christine was right. There were not many professions to begin with that were open to women, and as educated as Christine was thanks to Erik's efforts in that regard, Mme. Giry doubted she would be able to secure a position as teacher or governess, especially considering the language problem. While all three of them spoke Italian adequately by now, they were far from mastering it completely, and who would want to hire a teacher that was not a hundred percent perfect in that regard? Christine also lacked the qualifications to work as a nurse, and while her sewing had vastly improved recently, her stitches were not quite as even and regular as they would have to be if she sought employment as a seamstress. That really did not leave too many options.

"Maybe you should try singing then," Mme. Giry suggested. She had a bad feeling about it. While Christine had occasionally been humming lullabies for her baby, she had not sung one single note since the night of "Don Juan Triumphant", the night that had started and ended her dream of love and happiness.

"I cannot," Christine wailed. "How could I sing, knowing that he... Erik, my angel, that he will not be able to hear me..."

Mme. Giry patted her arm. "He will hear you," she said softly. "You know that our dear departed never completely leave us. Their love stays with us and surrounds us. Erik is watching over you and the boy from above, just like your father. Don't you think they would both love you to take up singing again?"

Christine shrugged. "I guess they might," she said with no enthusiasm whatsoever. "But I do not think I could do it anymore. I am out of practice, and the muscles in my torso, my diaphragm and all that, may have been affected by the pregnancy and me giving birth. I am not even sure I could reach my previous level of excellence, even if I tried. And then..." Christine hesitated for a moment, before adding. "It probably would not be good anyway, if people realized that I have been a prima donna before. That might cause suspicion and sooner or later my secret may come out. What then, if people find out that my name is not Katrina Almgren but Christine Daaé, that I have never been married, at least not legally, that my little angel is what the world refers to as a bastard?"

Mme. Giry nodded. Christine did have a point. But what else could she do for a living, if not sing? She had a child to support, a fatherless child, Christine definitely needed the money.

"Maybe you could sing in the choir?" she finally suggested. "That way, you would not have to be as perfect as you used to be, and you could blend in with the others and not draw attention to your beautiful voice and nobody would be the wiser as to your true identity."

Christine thought about it for a moment. "You think that might work?" she then asked hesitantly. "I may not even be good enough for the choir right now, but..." She thought about her dear angel Erik, how much he had loved her singing, and she knew that he would want her to continue with it, to not give up on music just because he was gone.

"Try it," Mme. Giry encouraged her. "Sing something for me, and for our little Erik. Don't you think your son deserves to hear your voice, the voice that his father helped develop and loved so much?"

Christine thought about it for a moment, then smiled. "You are right," she then agreed. "Erik Gustave is my angel's son and my father's grandson, he comes from a family of musicians, and it therefore would be wrong to withhold music from him. I will have to try and find my music again, if for no other reason, then for his sake."

Christine breathed deeply, then began to sing a Swedish lullaby. Her voice was certainly rusty, her breathing technique had suffered greatly, and the fact that tears were running down her cheeks as she thought of her Angel, and almost made her choke on the words, did not really help, but Mme. Giry thought that with a little practice, Christine might be able to pass an audition for the opera choir.

"Remember the Opéra Populaire," she told Christine. "The choir there, those singers were all adequate, some even good, but none would have been able to pull off a leading role. Now that you have neglected your voice for so long, you are on a similar level as they were. You should be good enough for the choir. Give it a try. Meg said they are hiring at the moment."

Christine nodded obediently. She still was not sure she would be able to carry it off, to actually sing without starting to cry at the memories of times past, but she was determined to find a job, to earn enough money that her little darling, the light of her life, would not want for anything, and to bring music into the child's life, music, which had been the major force binding her and Erik together, joining their hearts for all eternity.

Xxxx

A few days later Christine auditioned for the local opera house. She told the managers that she had been training to become a singer, but then she had madly fallen in love and gotten married before she could try for a job at a major theater. After her husband's untimely death in an accident and her pregnancy, she needed a job to support her baby, and hoped that she would now be able to put those singing lessons to good use.

Her voice was still a bit uneven at the audition, but the managers realized the potential of the young soprano and hired her for the choir. "You might consider taking a few more singing lessons," they advised, "your voice is truly unique. With a little bit more training you may be eligible for smaller solo roles. That would pay more..."

Christine nodded, saying she would consider it. Right now, that her son was still so young, she was not sure she would be able to make the time, but maybe in a few years...


	11. Rico

I am back! I am once again sorry for the long wait, but family and tons of work got in the way of writing... :-( I also know I still owe you the conclusion of "When We've Said Good-bye". That may be coming later this week, though I do not dare make any promises as to when exactly.

Thank you all *so* much for sticking with me despite my poor updating recently. A special thank you goes to my reviewers, to those that have put the story on alert or have added it to their favorites, but those that only read are also very, very much appreciated! I love you all and will try to update a bit more regularly in the future.

Anyway, I do not own anything or anybody, you know that anyway, and I do not want to keep you much longer from reading, since we are facing a major plot development...

Chapter 11 – Rico

To her immense surprise, Christine liked her work in the choir. She realized that she had indeed missed music and the busy life around a theater. To her delight little Erik Gustave seemed to greatly enjoy her singing, the boy thrived on music, nothing could sooth him like a song from his mother, no matter how sad and doleful the melodies were that Christine sang for the little one. The baby's fascination with music was yet another motivation for her to pursue her career again, if only in the choir.

The unassuming, quiet young woman soon made friends with the other members of the choir. At first, they did not dare approach Christine, her black widow's dress and the pain at the bottom of her eyes seemed to forbid any small talk, but with time, several of the other ladies began to befriend her. They soon knew that the young widow had a baby to support. They found Christine's story, – at least what she told them about her past – incredibly sad, but also incredibly romantic in a tragic way, for what could possibly be worse than realizing that you were in love with somebody you had known for years, and getting married to him, only to lose him in an accident weeks later, just a few days before finding out you were carrying his child?

"At least you have your baby," her new friend Lucia comforted Christine. "He must be your pride and joy."

Christine smiled, her whole face lighting up at the thought of her son. "He is my everything," she admitted. "It just makes me so sad that my... husband could never meet him. He did not even know about him, he died before I found out..." Tears were welling in her beautiful eyes.

"Sh, don't cry," Lucia tried to calm her. "Think of your little boy. Think what a great gift your husband left you." Then she asked, "how old is your baby now, by the way?" Thus she effectively turned the conversation from Christine's grief over her Angel to her son.

Christine smiled. "Six months," she explained, "and he has already grown so much! He is adorable, he reminds me so much of his father, and he likes it when I sing to him."

Lucia smiled as well. "He must be quite something," she commented. "What did you say his name was?"

"Erik," Christine replied. "Erik Gustave, after his father and grandfather."

Lucia shook her head. "Those are unusual names," she said. "Your son will have problems with such strange names once he gets older and meets other children to play with."

"Those names are very common in Sweden, where my... my husband's family comes from." Christine remembered just in time that Almgren was supposed to be her married name and that therefore Erik had to have been of Swedish descent, not her.

Lucia thought about it for a moment. "Erik..." she murmured, "I think that might be Errico in Italian, not too common either, but still... You could call him Rico for short, that sounds like a proper italian name. That way he won't be regarded as a foreigner, once he is old enough to make friends in the neighborhood."

Christine smiled. She knew Lucia was right and that an italian sounding name would help her little angel with the other children. It would also somehow distinguish him from his father and namesake. That way, she could say "Erik" when she was talking about her Angel and "Rico", when she meant their son.

"That is a lovely idea," she beamed at Lucia, hugging her. From that day on, she called her son Rico.

Xxx

Three years had passed. Erik's lung was still bothering him somewhat, even in the milder, southern climate. But this was nothing compared to the pain his broken heart caused him. It almost seemed as if he missed Christine more with every passing day, as if the pain over losing her, instead of diminishing over time grew even stronger. Nadir's attempts at comforting him seemed to fall on deaf ears.

"You cannot imagine," Erik whined, "what it is like to finally, after all those years, find love and get a glimpse at what heaven might be like, only to have it ripped away from you so suddenly..."

Nadir sighed. "I am afraid, I can," he said softly, fighting back tears at the memories of those terrible days that had destroyed his own dreams of happiness. "Or have you forgotten that I lost my wife as well? Not only her, but my son..." Nadir made an effort to compose himself. "And they are both gone, dead. Not even a miracle can bring them back to me, whereas Mlle. Daaé... at least we can be reasonably certain that she is still alive, and where there is life there is hope."

Once Erik calmed down somewhat, Nadir tried to change the subject, bringing up Erik's health again. "You really should consult a doctor about your lung," he suggested. "You once again were coughing during most of last winter despite the mild climate here."

Erik glared at him. "And how do you suppose I do that without him noticing something strange about my face?" he growled. "The Phantom may have been declared dead, but if somebody begins to suspect..."

Nadir nodded. "That's why I think we should move again. There was an article in the papers recently about a specialist in Turin, who has had astonishing success with similar cases..." Nadir did not add the main reason why he wanted to move to Italy, namely that there Erik would not be a wanted criminal. He did not expect that specialist to be able to heal Erik's lung, since he had decided long ago that the problem was most likely psychosomatic, that Erik's depression was the main reason why his lung refused to heal properly.

Erik groaned. "What purpose does it serve?" he wailed. "I am not dying of it, and even if, I am not sure this would be that much worse than what I am going through now..."

Nadir shook his head disapprovingly. "Of course it would be worse," he chastised Erik. "Because then you would truly abandon the ladies, give up hope of ever finding them again. Not to mention the grief you would cause me and Darius. Because, believe it or not, we do love you, too. You are family to us. Isn't that what you always wanted, a family that loves you?"

Erik's eyes softened. He knew Nadir had a point. He and Darius had nursed him back to health and had taken care of him over the past years. They had shown him more love and acceptance than his own mother ever had and had treated him like their beloved younger brother.

"I am sorry, Nadir," Erik sobbed. "I am an ungrateful beast. You and Darius have both done so much for me, you are both true friends and all the family I have left, and if it makes you happy, then so be it, let's move to Turin and consult this specialist."

Nadir beamed. "Erik Charles Garroux, I knew you would be reasonable about this," he stated. "Which is why I have already put up this house for sale."

Xxxx

About a month later, the three men had sold the small house they had lived in for the past three years, packed up their belongings and were headed towards Italy. "You will like it there," Nadir told Erik. "Or have you forgotten that Italy is the home of music? Every shepherd there plays some kind of pipe and the women in the countryside sing to their work. I bet it will be similar in the city, there will be music in the air. There even is an opera house in Turin," he added mischievously.

Erik winced. "Do we have to live in town?" he asked nervously. He hated crowds and the loud clatter of everyday life. "Surely we do not have to endure the noise and dirt and those crowds of people in order to see a doctor? Please tell me we can take up residence in the suburbs, or a small village a bit outside of the town?"

Nadir nodded. "I think that can be arranged," he said, "I just thought you might want to be close to an opera house again and be able to attend a performance every now and then. Don't you miss it?"

Erik thought about it for a moment. In a way he did miss life at a theater, the rehearsals, the influence he had had. It had been fun to control the managers and practically make all the major decisions, but none of it really mattered compared to how much he missed Christine.

He shook his head. "I miss Christine," he confessed, "Without her, opera means nothing to me. Not any more..."

Nadir sighed. He had a feeling that Erik's mood, and as a consequence his health, would improve once he found his music again. He had tried everything to re-awake Erik's interest in this once beloved art, but so far none of his efforts had yielded any results. Moving to Italy was a last resort in that regard as well. If the music-loving Italian people could not fill Erik's ailing mind with music again, then he feared nothing could.

"He used to express himself so well through his compositions," Nadir thought. "Music always provided an outlet for his emotions. He could work through depression, frustration, melancholy with the help of music. Without it he is lost. I wish I could find that woman and bring her to him, though I fear it would be too late anyway. Four years have passed since that night that almost cost Erik his life, and even if she once did love Erik, she probably has moved on by now and has found new love elsewhere. But he will never get over her. She not only took his heart with her, but his soul, his music as well."

But he promised Erik that they would be trying to find a new home at the outskirts of Turin.

Xxxx

The past three years had not been easy on Christine. Even though a lot of time had passed since that terrible night at the Opéra Populaire, she could not get over the loss of her Angel. She still wore her black widow's clothes, thus signaling to potential suitors that she was not available for dating. She sang in the choir at the opera house, and occasionally got a small solo part with several lines, but that was it. Her voice still had the magnificent sound from before the tragedy, but Christine was not able anymore to hit the glorious bigh notes again that had been associated with "La Daaé". Her voice felt like a bird whose wings had been broken and that therefore could not rise up towards the heavens anymore.

Nevertheless, her singing was still good enough for the choir and the tiny solos and thanks to the money she made that way, she was able to support herself and her son. The older he got, the more Rico reminded her of his father. The boy was tall for his age and lanky, he was incredibly bright and loved music with a passion. Even at only three years he could carry a tune, he imitated the birds' calls and was able to coax music out of almost anything.

Music was not the only interest the boy had inherited from his father. He could draw extremely well, created magnificent buildings with his wooden building blocks and was every bit as sportive and agile as his father had been. There was no tree Rico could not climb, no ditch he could not jump over, nothing that could stop him from wherever he wanted to go.

Sometimes Christine worried when her little one was roaming the neighborhood with his friends, but Mme. Giry laughed. "He is a boy," she said. "Boys need exercise. And remember who his father was. Our Rico has inherited Erik's strength and resilience as well." When she saw the genuine concern in Christine's eyes, she laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. "He will be fine," she said softly. "He knows how much he means to you, and he is responsible beyond his age. He will not endanger himself. Trust him."

Christine then smiled her uneasy smile. Deep down she knew that her foster mother was right and that her son needed the physical exercise just as much as he needed music, but the worry only left her eyes once the child was home and filled the house with excited tales of what he had seen and done that day.

Xxxx

Even though Rico was good friends with the other children of similar age in the small community a the outskirts of Turin where they lived, he sometimes preferred not to play with the others, but to explore the surroundings on his own. He loved to observe birds or insects, to lie in the grass and gaze up at the sky, or to simply sit and listen to the various sounds of nature around him. Sometimes he would try to imitate those sounds with his voice, and sometimes, by listening to them he would suddenly feel a melody surge within himself, a melody that needed expression, and he then began to hum or whistle it.

He had a favorite place for this pastime. At the other side of the village there was a property that had long been deserted. The previous owner had died, his son, who lived in the center of Turin, had tried to sell the house, but so far had not found a potential buyer yet. Thus the house was locked off and the large garden that belonged to it was untended. Rico loved that garden. There were wild flowers and brushes growing between the neglected rose bushes, magnolias and oleanders. Rare birds were nesting in the relative safety of the deserted garden. Rico adored the primordial beauty of this place, and whenever he wanted to be alone he climbed over the fence and hid there.

Today Rico did not feel like playing with his friends. He needed solitude and the quiet majesty of nature to surround him. He needed to listen to the birds and bees and try to find the melody inside him. His mother had been so sad this morning, she had talked about his father and grandfather, those two wonderful men he was named after, that she missed so much and wished he could have met, about how sad she had been when her dear papa had died, and how her Angel (Rico knew by now that that was what she called his father, he presumed because the latter was in Heaven now, looking down upon them), how her Angel had comforted her and been there for her, so understanding and loving. Something in Rico had stirred when she had talked like that about the relationship between her and her father and about what a warm, caring man his own father had been. A longing of some kind had emerged within him, a wish to be able to meet this man, to know how it felt to have a living, breathing father like the other children, to have a male role-model in one's life.

Rico loved his mother dearly, and granny Antoinette and aunt Rita (short for Margherita, as Meg was called in Italy), too. But for the first time it dawned on him that he had not one single male relative. He not only had no father or grandfather, there were no brothers, uncles or cousins either. Somehow that thought made him sad and he had a feeling as if a melody was about to form inside his head, a melody that would help him express those feelings and deal with them.

He needed solitude for the melody to develop and fill his mind so that he could give voice to it. Therefore Rico headed towards his favorite hiding place, the deserted garden. He did not go far in this time. A big old magnolia-tree near the fence beckoned to him. Rico quickly climbed up and found a comfortable perch on a thick branch. He looked up into the thick, green foliage, watching a few birds a bit higher up in the treetop, and suddenly the melody he had been waiting for, made itself way and a plaintive song emerged from Rico's throat. He did not use words, he just vocalized the doleful tune.

Rico sang on and on, pouring his grief over the loss of the unknown father and grandfather into his song, not realizing that he was not alone anymore. A tall, slender figure stayed half-hidden between the underbrush and listened to the clear, soft voice of the boy. It had not taken Erik long to localize the source of the song. He could spot a child's bare feet dangling from one of the lower branches of the magnolia in the far back corner of the garden. He remained quite still, so as not to disturb the little musician. He smiled to himself. How angry had he been this morning, when Nadir had insisted he accompany him on his trip to inspect a property they might want to rent or buy! But now he did not regret having come here anymore. The house had not interested him, but he had spotted rosebushes in the garden, and when he went to have a look at them he had suddenly heard the song. It was not a known folksong the likes of which children were likely to sing, in fact, the melody was quite complex, yet hauntingly beautiful. So he had gone to see who it was that sang in the abandoned garden and had noticed the child half-hidden by the foliage.

Erik was not the only one to spot Rico, though. A few other children had been playing near the abandoned property and had heard the song as well. They had recognized their friend's voice and had looked around to find where he was hiding. Just like Erik they soon spotted Rico in the magnolia tree at the other side of the fence. "Rico!" a boy's voice screamed. "what are you doing in there? Come and play with us!"

Rico sighed. He knew that there was no point in pretending he had not heard his friends. His inspiration was gone anyway, now that his song had been interrupted so brutally. He would not find his melody again, at least not anytime soon. "I need to hide better next time," he thought, "go in deeper into that garden, where they cannot see me from outside."

Rico looked down at his friends and shouted, "Vengo!" (I am coming). With that he jumped from the tree and ran towards the fence which he climbed quickly.

Erik stared after him. He had not expected the young musician to be that small. From the musical expertise expressed in that beautiful song, he had guessed that the singer must be eight to ten years old at least. That boy – Rico his friends had called him – was only four or five to judge from his height. How could such a young child sing like that? Erik was intrigued and wanted to learn more about this incredibly gifted boy and he also wanted to capture the melody the child had sung and which had touched him in a way he did not quite understand. He returned to the house and rummaged through the drawers of some half-broken desk. When half an hour later Nadir looked for Erik after having inspected every nook and cranny of the house, he found his friend huddled over the desk, humming a plaintive tune and scribbling notes on a plain sheet of paper on which he had hastily drawn stave lines.


	12. Plans

Well, there it is, the next chapter. I know you are all waiting for some father-son interaction, and I promise it's coming. Soon. And to clarify things, little Rico is actually three and a half, since it's spring again (remember, he was born in November), but since he is tall for his age (Erik's genes showing), Erik thinks he might be five. Yeah, we wouldn't want to make it too easy for Erik to guess who the boy is. (evil grin) A little suffering is good for the soul. :-p

Anyway, thank you all for reading and reviewing, for favoriting and putting the story on alert. I know it sounds as repetitive as a broken record, but I realy could not do this without you all! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

And I do not own POTO or anything even remotely connected to it, sigh!

Chapter 12 - Plans

Nadir smiled. So he had been right and Erik had indeed found his music again in this sunny country. Hopefully his friend would now be able to overcome his depression, to let his broken heart heal and eventually regain his former health in the process. "I take it, that you like it here?" he asked Erik. "Shall we rent this house, then?"

Erik looked up from the piece of paper on which he had been scribbling, and stared at Nadir. He was slightly disoriented and it took him a moment to process what the latter was talking about. Erik felt like he had been in another world, a world of dreams and music, from which he had been brutally removed and put back into the here and now. Then he remembered.

"There was a boy outside in the garden," he murmured. "The most unusual child you can imagine, Nadir. Maybe five years old, but musically gifted in a way I would not have thought possible in such a young child. He was sitting in a tree, singing, not a common folksong, I doubt it was a song at all, for there were no words. He might have made it up while singing, but even if he was trying to reproduce something he had heard elsewhere it takes an incredibly talented child to sing such a complex tune. It was beautiful, Nadir, I tell you, hauntingly beautiful, and so sad!"

Nadir beamed! A child! Why had he not thought of this before? Erik had a great way with children and loved teaching them and caring for them. He had been the best friend of his own ailing little son and he had apparently also done a great job helping Christine deal with the loss of her father and teaching her to sing. A child he could befriend and teach might be almost as good a remedy against Erik's depression as a reunion with his beloved Christine. If this boy had peeked Erik's curiosity...

"A boy?" Nadir asked, trying to hide his eagerness to learn more about Erik's encounter with the child. "An intruder in the garden?"

Erik shrugged. "I guess you could call him that, but then, as far as I know, the house is abandoned, the garden untended. A child probably sees this as the perfect playground, as some kind of unclaimed property that may be visited at will, like e.g. a grove would be." He frowned, remembering something. "There were other children, too," he explained, "but outside the fence. They must have heard him or seen him, or both, and called for him, and he jumped down the tree, climbed over the fence and joined them." He shook his head. It was kind of strange that the other children had not come in, but called for their friend to come out. "It seemed as if he were the only one coming here...," he added. "The others stayed outside."

Nadir did not consider this a problem. On the contrary, if this supposedly oh so remarkable little boy was used to coming here on his own, it would be easier for Erik to befriend him. "He may just be the most courageous of the lot," he came up with an explanation for this slightly odd fact. "Or maybe he appreciates nature's wilderness around here more than the others, or maybe," and that possibility appealed to Nadir most, for it was the one best suited to help Erik, "maybe he is a bit of a loner. If he is as gifted as you say, he might appreciate some time apart from his friends. Peace and quiet, in order to express his feelings in music or something like that." He grinned at Erik mischievously. "Reminds you of somebody we know?" he asked his friend with a twinkle in his eyes.

Erik sighed. He could not deny that he was intrigued by the little musician he had discovered in this tiny village at the outskirts of Turin. He definitely wanted to meet the boy again, to learn more about his talent and love for music. He had a feeling as if this boy could fill a void inside him, as if guiding him and helping him to fully develop his talent could bring a purpose and new meaning to his wretched, miserable existence.

"We cannot scare him off," Erik whispered. "We need to make sure he will come back so that I can make his acquaintance one way or another."

Nadir nodded. Erik was of course right. He had to meet the boy "by chance", preferably when the boy was singing again. Things could then develop naturally, a question about the song would lead into a conversation about music, and hopefully the boy would be impressed by Erik's vast knowledge in that area and would want to come back on his own. Once the two would have become friends there would still be time to contact the parents and officially get their permission for Erik to teach the child.

Of course he could go into the village and ask at the baker's shop about the boy. It should not be hard to find out who he was, there could not be too many children around with such a unique talent, but then, how willing would anybody be to tell him, the oriental-looking stranger, about a five-year old? And what would he say if they asked what business of his it was to inquire about such a young child? That his deformed, depressed, heart-broken friend needed a diversion and that boy seemed to be the ideal person to provide just that? No, they would think of him and Erik as two perverted old men and would do their best to keep the boy as far away from them as possible. As much as Nadir disliked the idea, it was probably best to initiate contact with the child first, behind the backs of his parents, and once he and Erik had gained the little one's trust, there would still be time to meet the boy's family and get their permission to continue teaching him.

"We must make sure he will come here again," Nadir thought aloud. "Which means he cannot know of our presence. He must believe that the house and garden are still abandoned, for he probably would not enter somebody else's home. He also probably would not come if we invited him, for any parents worth their salt will teach a child not to accept a stranger's invitation."

Erik grinned. "We will rent the house right away, but tell the owner that for some reason or other we will not be able to move in at once. It might take another two or three weeks, before we can use it, but in order to secure the house, which we like, we will pay the rent for the current month. That way he will give us the keys. He will probably also tell the neighbors that new tenants will move in soon. If the boy hears about this, he might come one last time to say good-bye to the wilderness. And if he does not hear about the new inhabitants, he will think the garden is still deserted and come anyway."

Nadir smiled. "And then we will meet him."

Erik shook his head. "Who said anything about you? _I _will meet him. I will be staying here on my own for the next two or three weeks, but nobody will know about my presence. Darius may stop by tomorrow night, once it is dark, with a few provisions and some clothes. He should make sure that he is not seen, then he must return to Turin. The house and garden must look deserted and everybody in this community needs to think it is, otherwise I don't think the boy will come back."

Nadir hesitated. He knew that Erik's plan was sound, that the village would believe the house deserted, while, as the rightful tenant, Erik would have every right in the world to be there, when the boy did show up. For a brief moment he considered if it was a good idea to leave Erik and that strange boy alone. The whole setup did have an uncanny resemblance to a trap. Was it possible that something good could spring from such a forced encounter? Then he shook his head. No, the boy would be safe with Erik. He could trust his friend in that regard, and should the parents get upset about the situation, he could vouch for Erik and tell them how he had trusted him with his own son so many years ago. His little darling Reza...

Nadir fought back tears. This was not the time to get all worked up about his own lost family. Erik needed him. And maybe in helping Erik he would be able to help a very special young boy develop his own talent.

"Fine," Nadir agreed with Erik. "We will do it that way. You stay here on your own and try to make the acquaintance of this unusual child, while Darius and I will have a look around Turin to find us some furniture and other household effects we may need here. The house does not seem too well equipped in terms of pots and pans, china, silverware and the like. And am I wrong if I assume that we will need to purchase a piano and huge amounts of staff paper?"

Erik stared at his friend uncomprehendingly. "A piano? Staff paper?" he asked. "What for?"

Nadir pointed at the piece of paper Erik had been scribbling on earlier. "A certain friend of mine may feel the urge to compose," he chuckled. "Or maybe you might need those items once you start teaching your new protégé."

Erik looked down at the paper, as if seeing it for the first time. Could it be? Had he truly started to write music again? He had thought this impossible after he had lost Christine. He looked closer at what he had written, humming a few notes and then whispered in awe. "The song, the boy's song. It spoke to me, I had to … to reply to it, to make it my own. This... this is a variation of his main theme, a continuation of it..."

Nadir chuckled. He'd better go and handle the paperwork with the owner of the house. The sooner Erik could meet this unique child again, the better for him it would be.

Xxxx

Christine was looking through her wardrobe, reattaching a button here, repairing a lose hem there, when her eyes fell on the one dress at the very back of her closet that was not black, the wedding dress Erik had chosen for her, the dress he had forced her to wear that night, that he had peeled off her so expertly during their lovemaking, the dress she had hoped to wear in front of the altar, when she and her Angel would be joined in holy matrimony. A sigh escaped her lips and her fingers tenderly caressed the soft fabric. Erik had once touched that dress, every detail of it spoke of his love for her. In a way she felt closer to him by touching the fabric.

"Papa, you must think I am such an ungrateful wench," she sobbed. "You picked the most wonderful man for me, you sent me this marvelous Angel, that loved me and cared about me, protected me and guided me through the formative years of my life, but because of a tiny imperfection that did not diminish his personality in any way, shape or form, I did not appreciate him the way he deserved, denied him my heart and drove him to extremes. I guess it only serves me right that he was taken away from me in such a cruel way. I obviously did not deserve him. I was not worthy of his love. But to punish me for the pain I had inflicted on him, God made me realize my Angel's greatness and acknowledge my love for him right before I lost him."

Tears were running down her cheeks now as she thought of how much pain she had caused Erik by her betrayal, and then remembered how he had died a slow and painful death at the hands of the angry mob. "That was my fault too," she sobbed. "If I had not conspired with Raoul to catch him, none of these things would have happened, the chandelier, the fire, Piangi... it was my fault that these people grew angry at him, hunted him down and killed him like a beast."

Christine buried her face in the soft white fabric of the dress. "Angel," she sobbed, "I love you so much, that it hurts. Was that how you felt when I was engaged with Raoul?"

She looked up embarrassed when she heard footsteps approaching, and her son appeared in the door of her room. "Mamma!" Rico exclaimed, "don't cry! It makes me so sad!"

He ran to her and put his arms around her. Christine hugged him back, trying to compose herself. "My little Angel," she murmured, clinging to the boy. "What would I do without you?"

Once she had calmed down and released her son from her embrace, Rico noticed the white dress. Since Christine usually kept it at the very back of her closet he had never seen it before. "What is this?" he asked surprised. "A white dress? Whose is it?"

Christine sighed. "Mine," she murmured. "My wedding dress."

Rico grinned. "Oh, mamma, did you wear that when you and papa got married? You must have looked so pretty!"

Christine smiled. Her son's enthusiasm was contagious. She hesitated for a moment, before she nodded. "Yes, that's the dress I wore when your papa and I..." She did not finish the sentence. She did not want to tell such a blatant lie to her trusting son. She was not married, never had been. She was not going to tell him about a wedding that had never taken place. But she could not tell him the truth either, namely that he was a lovechild, a bastard without rights in society, for this truth would weigh heavily on him, and would make things almost as hard for him as the disfigurement had done for his father.

"And papa?" Rico asked. "What did he wear? Do you keep his wedding outfit as well?"

Christine shook her head. "No," she said, "I do not keep any of your father's clothes." Then somehow evading her son's direct question yet still giving him an answer, she added. "Your father was always impeccably dressed. He was so handsome." Christine blushed. She knew that Erik would never have believed her if she had called him that, but to her he was the most attractive man in the world. She did not feel disgusted by his grotesque face anymore, since to her it was the face of her beloved.

"Tall and skinny," she elaborated, smiling at Rico. "You look a lot like him," she told her son, "you will one day be the most dashing young man in the village. And a great musician," she added with pride.

Rico listened to his mother's words, as she continued talking about his father, telling him for the thousandth time what a great musician he had been, a genius, how sweet and beautiful his voice had sounded, and above all, how warm and loving and caring he had been, how safe and protected she had always felt with him and how utterly proud he would be of his son.

Rico smiled. There were no pictures of his father around the house, but from what his mother used to tell him, he imagined that unknown father to be a striking young man, similar in age to his mother, a well educated man with impeccable manners and a heart of gold, and the more his mother told him about "her Angel", the more he wished he could have met him.

Christine talked and talked about Erik, but while she went into details about the wonderful qualities her Angel had possessed, she avoided anything that would reveal the fact that he had bee the notorious Opera Ghost, who had been hunted down as a criminal and slain by an angry mob.

"I cannot tell him that," she thought. "He is too young anyway, but even later, once he will be older, I do not know, if I will ever have the strength to tell him everything. He has a right to know his origins, yes, but what if the knowledge of his father's actions, the fact that his parents had never been married and his mother had only pretended to be a widow, what if those news crushed him, broke his spirit and caused him to have low self-esteem, see himself as an outcast of society?

Her beloved Angel's self-esteem certainly had been lacking. What if the boy, who was so much like his father in so many ways, had inherited this trait together with all the other talents and characteristics he shared with his father?

"How did you meet papa?" Rico's question brought Christine back to the present.

"I...," what could she say? That he had sung to her through walls when she had been a seven-year-old orphan? No, that was too close to the truth that she wanted to keep from her son, at least for now. "I had known him for many years," she finally answered, "but I was just a little girl when he entered my life and of course I had no idea then that I would one day fall in love with him, and neither did he. Things just developed, at first I did not admit those feelings even to myself, and when I finally did..."

Rico put his small arms around his mother. "Don't cry, mamma," he said. "I am glad you found out you loved him, before he died, and that you had me, and I am sure papa was glad, too, when you finally knew you loved him."

Christine nodded. She was glad, too, she had realized her love for Erik in the end, late, yes, but not too late to show him, to give him the ultimate proof of her love and in thus doing create their son, who reminded her so much of her dead Angel.


	13. Wait

Once again, thank you all so very much for reading, reviewing, putting on alert or adding to favorites! I don't know what I'd do without your support. I probably would have given up long ago.

Anyway, here is the new chapter, it is a major build-up to the all-decisive meeting of our two Eriks. I hope you'll like it! And for those of you who do not know any Italian: nonna means grandmother and zia means aunt, while mamma is the Italian spelling for mummy.

And I still don't own anything or anybody...

Chapter 13 - Wait

Everything went as planned. Nadir rented the house, telling the owner that they would move in not right away, but soon, probably within the next two to three weeks. Erik settled down in the still abandoned house, trying to make himself comfortable with what little usable furniture there was left and with whatever supplies Darius brought him at night, unseen by the villagers. In addition to food and some of Erik's clothes, Darius also handed him a stack of staff paper and a violin. Since a piano could not be delivered without being noticed, Nadir had purchased the violin for his friend, at the music shop where he had gotten the staff paper. That way Erik would not be left without an instrument for too long, now that he had rediscovered his need for music.

Darius beamed with joy, as he noticed Erik's obvious interest in the latter two items. He had grown rather fond of Erik over the past four years and had been just as worried about the younger man's seemingly incurable depression and melancholy as Nadir, but just like his master he was convinced that the new-found interest in music would go a long way towards healing Erik's mind and soul.

"I will be back next week," Darius promised, "with more food and other items." He looked around. "The master was right. We will need to buy some furniture, there is not much here that we can use." He turned to Erik. "Are you sure you will be alright here, master Erik?" he asked. "This house lacks the most basic amenities, and it certainly needs some cleaning..."

Erik nodded. "I will be fine," he reassured the servant. "I will be able to tidy it up a bit, and I am used to less than ideal accommodations. As long as you make sure I won't have to starve, I will be quite comfortable here."

Darius gave him an uncertain look. He was not too convinced it was a good idea to leave Erik alone. That boy had a tendency of forgetting to eat and drink and sometimes he stayed up the whole night, brooding. Darius was worried that Erik might not take good care of himself without his two friends and guardians keeping an eye on him. He was determined to come back as soon as possible and if Erik then showed signs of neglect, nothing and nobody would make him leave the boy again.

As soon as Darius had left, Erik opened the violin case and looked at the instrument. It was a new one, nothing like the beautiful, old one, he had possessed and which was now forever buried in the cellars of the Opéra Populaire together with his other possessions. It had been risky enough for Nadir and Darius to go in to search for him, they had not dared returning there again for some of Erik's stuff, most of which would have been destroyed and ransacked by the mob anyway. Fortunately, Erik kept most of his money with Nadir, so he had been able to buy new clothes and other necessities. So far, an instrument had not been deemed necessary, but after his encounter with that talented child earlier today, Erik felt strangely drawn to the violin. He slowly took it out of its case and picked up the bow. Anticipation filled him. What would this new violin sound like? Would he even be able to play it or had his fingers gotten stiff over the past years that he had not touched an instrument?

He hesitantly let the bow glide across the strings, then smiled. How stupid of him! Of course he had to tune the violin first! How could he have forgotten? He quickly made some adjustments and soon the instrument sounded right. It did not have the deep, warm sound of his old violin, but a certain sweetness which Erik found quite soothing. He began to play. He started with the melody the boy had sung, then added a plaintive motive which somehow had emerged from the depth of his own troubled soul. His loneliness, his love and longing for Christine all found expression in his playing and when he finally stopped hours later, Erik was exhausted. He realized that he had played the violin for the better part of the night and that the new day was about to dawn.

Erik cursed. "I should not do this," he scolded himself. "If I want the villagers to think this house is still deserted, I should keep as quiet as possible. Yes, the house is at a certain distance from the nearest neighbors and everybody was probably asleep anyway, but still..." He was glad, that at least he had been at the backside of the house, in a room facing away from the street and towards the garden. That way, at least nobody would have seen the lone candle he had lit.

He quickly put away the violin, then lay down on the rickety old sofa and fell asleep. When Erik awoke several hours later, the sun was shining outside. It was a beautiful day. "Just the right weather for a child to run around and play outdoors," Erik thought. He felt himself getting nervous. Would the boy come again today? If so, would he sing again, or would he just explore the gorgeous wilderness of the long neglected garden, wander through the underbrush, climb a tree? And if he came – would he be alone again, or would he bring friends? Maybe he had told the other children of the garden's beauty and they wanted to see for themselves? Would he even get a chance to talk to the boy alone, even if the latter did come today?

Erik restlessly paced up and down the room, his eyes glued to the huge French door, hoping to spot any sign of the child's presence. Several times he came close to walking out into the garden and looking for the boy, but then decided against it. What if the boy saw him while climbing the fence and then did not dare enter? No, he had to wait till the boy was inside, preferably singing. When the child's mind was occupied with music it would be easy for Erik to sneak up on him and start a conversation.

Two hours later, Erik sank down on the sofa again. His feet began to hurt from all the pacing. Very annoyed he realized that he was terribly out of shape. He was not used to physical exertion anymore. A few years ago, when he had haunted the Opéra Populaire, his stamina had been practically endless, he had run up and down those hundreds of steps several times a day, rowed across the subterranean lake, climbed around the rafters and spent half the night in front of his organ, composing, without feeling half as tired as he felt now.

"I have become soft," he stated, angry at himself. "If I were in any danger now and had to defend myself, I would not stand a chance." And he decided he had to do something about his lack of strength and energy. Not now though, now he had to watch out for the boy, but tonight, once it was getting dark and he could be sure that no children were roaming the streets anymore. A few push-ups would probably do him some good and gymnastics to help him get back his agility...

Xxxx

A few days passed, with Erik in front of the French doors, desperately waiting for the sweet sound that had called to him so strongly the day of his arrival. But no matter how quietly he stayed hidden, and how patiently he waited, the boy had not returned yet. In the evenings, Erik now worked out and to his satisfaction he slowly felt his old strength return. When Darius came back with more provisions at the end of the week, he immediately noticed that Erik looked stronger and healthier than when he had last seen him, though a bit restless.

"Tell Nadir that he has to stay at the inn for a while longer," Erik quickly told him. "I need more time here, the boy has not returned yet..." He felt just as annoyed as he sounded. He had somehow expected the child to come here regularly, if not daily, then at least every other day, but five days had passed without the boy entering the garden again.

Darius nodded. "I will tell the master," he promised, knowing that Nadir would be only too willing to stay away for another week or two, if he told him, how well Erik seemed to be now. "Do you have everything you need?" he then asked, "is there anything else you might want me to bring next time?"

Erik shook his head. True, the house was not too comfortable, but the old sofa on which he slept was a thousand times better than the cage he had lived in at the gypsy camp during most of his childhood, and thanks to Darius' nightly delivery he had enough food, toiletries, clothes and candles for the time being. "Thank you," he said. "I have everything I need."

"Except for my Christine," he thought sadly. "I will probably never see her again. I have to get used to that. It's been four years, and if we could not find her trace then, we won't be able to find it now, after so much time has passed." Erik sighed. If at least he could see that boy again, maybe if he took on another pupil, taught another child the way he had taught her, maybe then he could find peace. Maybe he could be of service to that boy, help him develop his talent. Maybe Nadir had been right all along, maybe there _was_ a reason why he had survived that attack.

Xxxx

Little Rico had spent a few wonderful days with his friends. There had been so much excitement! Carlo's father had built a new hen-house, and the boys had been allowed to watch and to help. Nothing too hard for a child, just holding a nail in place here and there, for Carlo's father to drive it in with the hammer. Once or twice they had even been allowed to try the hammer themselves. The good man had realized that in addition to getting his new hen-house built, he could teach the boys how to use a hammer and nails.

Then there had been the new baby-goats in the stable of Beppo's father, that they had visited and found awfully cute, and finally, Luca had had his birthday and had received a beautiful new ball from his parents that the boys had had to try out in the fields. Rico had been way too busy to think about music.

But today was different. His mother had once again been so sad this morning and it had made him sad as well. He loved her with all his heart and he wanted her to be happy again, to smile... Rico tried to remember, when had been the last time he had seen his mother smile, a genuine, happy smile, not the sad one she sometimes had, where her eyes seemed to weep while her mouth smiled. It had been several weeks. She smiled very rarely, but when she did, her whole face lit up and she looked even more beautiful than normally.

"I bet that's what she looked like when my papa was still alive," Rico thought. "Happy and smiling and beautiful. No wonder he liked her and married her." Then he frowned. "It must be incredibly sad to lose somebody you like," he thought and he tried to imagine how he would feel if his mother suddenly died, or his grandmother, or zia Rita. What would it be like to never see them again, never hear their voices again, to know that they would never, ever come back to him and hug him?

Rico shuddered. That thought was almost too much for the young boy. He knew that he would not feel like smiling ever again either, should he lose his mother. He could understand now only too well, that his dear mamma would always be so sad, but deep down he still wished she could be happy again, one day. "Maybe once I am all grown up and a famous musician," he thought, "and I can take her places and buy her nice clothes and we can live in a huge house with a beautiful garden, like the one at this abandoned house at the other end of the village, all of us, me and mamma and la nonna and zia Rita, and they won't have to work anymore, for I will make enough money for all of us, maybe then she will be happy again..." But something told him that even then, his mother would be content at best, but not truly happy. "Because of my papa," he whispered, sadly. "Why did he have to die and leave us alone? I never met him, but he must have been so very, very nice. Maybe even nicer than Carlo's father, who allowed us to help him with the hen-house."

And once again he thought about how utterly sad and unfair it was that all his friends had two parents, while he alone only had a mother. "I wish my papa had not died," he sobbed. "Then mamma would not cry so much, and maybe we could have a hen-house too and all the other things that fathers do!"

He was in a sombre mood again and did not feel like meeting with the other children and playing with them. He felt more like crying, yet obviously he could not do so at home, where his mother could see him, for there were no rehearsals the next few days, only evening performances. He knew that the current play was called "Il Trovatore", and that the choir was playing a group of gypsies in one scene and some nuns in another. His mother liked the latter scene better. Rico shook his head. His mother had tried to explain the story to him, but it had been too confusing. He was not sure anybody could understand that play and wondered why people would want to watch something like that. He was not even too sure what the title meant. His mother had explained that a Trovatore was some kind of musician, a singer. Then, why was it not called "The Musician" if that was what it meant? Maybe to confuse the audience even more?

Anyway, this strange play would run for another month and then the theater would go on hiatus over summer, thus rehearsals for the next production would not start anytime soon and his mother would be home during the day for the next few weeks. Therefore, if Rico felt like crying, as he did right now, he could not do so at home. He had to hide away somewhere, where his mother could not see him. Once again, the abandoned garden beckoned to him. There, he would be alone, nobody could disturb him. And maybe, there, that haunting melody he had imagined the other day, would come back to him. He had not thought about it anymore after his friends had found him and asked him to join them, but this melody had been so – beautiful, so meaningful. Maybe, if he could concentrate, he would find it again.

Rico quickly left the house and headed towards the abandoned garden. The closer he got, the more excited he became. How he loved the thick underbrush and the peaceful atmosphere of that garden, the wild flowers and the high grass, the many, many birds! He would go deeper into the garden this time. He did not want his friends to spot him again as they had done a few days ago. Maybe, if he went in far enough, they would not even hear him from outside. He definitely needed to be alone, to find this melody again...

Rico quickly scaled the fence and made his way towards the center of the abandoned garden. Maybe it was better not to climb a tree this time, where he could be easily spotted by his friends even from outside, maybe it was better to lie down in the high grass, among the many beautiful wild flowers, to observe the beetles and bumble-bees, listen to the birds. Maybe then the melody would come to him...

Still sobbing, Rico reached a nice opening between the beautiful old trees and laid down. At first he cried a bit, thinking again how utterly unfortunate it was that his papa had died so young, how sad it was that his mother cried so much and that he had nobody to do all those things with that fathers usually did with their children. Sure, mamma knew a lot about music and could explain it to him, but she had no knowledge about other things, like how to build a house. That was a man's domain. That's what a boy could learn from his father. After all, Carlo's papa had known how to build the hen-house. "Oh papa," Rico sobbed, "I know you did not do it on purpose and you would have wanted to stay with mother and me, but I so wish you had not died!"

After a while, the boy calmed down. The peaceful surroundings comforted him, and the longer he lay there, in the high grass, the more he began to enjoy nature's wonders. Somehow life was still good, despite... He almost sobbed again, when a colorful butterfly passed by and caught his attention. He wondered what it was called. Maybe his father would have known. Maybe... No, he did not want to dwell on such sad thoughts anymore, the world around him was so beautiful! Rico relaxed. He sat up, leaning against the trunk of a large peach tree, and followed the butterfly with his eyes. Suddenly he felt a melody within him, not the same one as last time, but equally beautiful, more serene in tone, more relaxed, but still somewhat melancholic. Once again, Rico began to sing, just a melody, no words. Sweet and rich and melodious the boy's clear voice rang out through the garden. Suddenly Rico almost choked in shock. A violin had begun playing what could only be interpreted as an answer to his own melody, and when he looked up, he saw a tall figure, wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat against the sun, leaning against the trunk of an almond tree, playing the violin...


	14. Encounter

Yes, I know, the lat chapter was a bit of a tease, ending right at the moment, where our two Eriks face each other, but they are talking now ;-)

Thank you all for reading, reviewing, adding to favorites or putting on alert! It always means so much to me when I get a message about a new follower, review or favorite and to judge from the stats, a lot of people are reading my stories. Thank you to all of you!

I still don't own anything or anybody, though, but you all know that by now. So on to the new chapter, let's see what our father and son have to discuss...

Chapter 14 - Encounter

Erik was getting really impatient. Over a week had passed since he first had heard that unusual boy sing, and every day his longing to hear that sweet voice again grew stronger, yet so far the little songbird had not returned. What if the child never came back? Maybe somebody had seen him entering or leaving the property and he had been punished by his parents for trespassing and forbidden to go there ever again? Erik sighed. How on earth was he supposed to meet that boy again if the latter did not come to the garden anymore? Surely he, Erik, could not go into the village and look for the child. At best he would be stared at because of his mask, more likely he'd scare everybody away.

The mask! Erik growled in frustration. Even if the child returned, the little one would most likely be frightened at the sight of this unusual attire. "I need to work out something," Erik thought. "I must find a way to look as normal as somebody with a face like mine possibly can." And he remembered how he had been working on a rubber mask at the time when he had first fallen in love with Christine and had hoped she would return his feelings. A mask that would have allowed him to walk with her in the park on Sundays like any other man could do with his woman. Erik remembered fairly well these experiments. The result had not been perfect yet, the arrival of the Vicomte had put an end to Erik's endeavors in that regard, since he had been far too busy trying to win Christine back to concentrate on the rubber mask. He had a few ideas how to improve the design, though. If only he had the necessary materials and tools. He made a note to ask Darius to provide him with these the next time he made a delivery. Should the boy come back before he had manufactured a fairly normal-looking mask, Erik decided that he would have to make sure the child only saw his left profile. He would have to wear his wide-brimmed straw-hat anyway, when he went out into the garden to talk to the child, since after over a decade of subterranean and nocturnal life he had become rather sensitive to sunshine.

Erik had just finished this line of thought and put the hat where he could quickly grab it, should the need arise, when he stopped dead in his tracks. There it was again, that sweet, clear sound, that had lured him into the garden that first day! Erik's heartbeat raced. He had been waiting for this moment for so long and now, that it finally was happening, that the child had obviously returned, he was getting nervous. His hands were shaking when he reached for the hat and put it on his head, making sure it sat at an angle that would conceal the masked part of his face as much as possible. He was about to rush out into the garden when his eyes fell upon the violin. Yes, he would take the instrument, he would show the boy that he was a musician too!

Erik quickly grabbed the violin, then ventured out into the garden. He silently approached the clearing from where the boy's song seemed to emanate. Once he had reached it, he spotted the boy, sitting in the high grass under a tree, leaning back onto the tree trunk, looking up at the foliage and the half-ripe peaches. Erik smiled. How cute the child was! Last time he had not got a good look at the boy, but now he could see him clearly. The little musician was rather lean, but seemed to be agile and sportive. His tanned face and rosy cheeks looked healthy and the full head of slightly wavy chocolate brown hair was simply adorable. Erik wondered, was there a connection between extraordinary musical talent and chocolate-brown hair? His Christine's luscious curls had been of a similar color when he had first met her after her father's death. Erik's heart skipped a beat and he closed his eyes, overwhelmed by the memory of seven-year-old Christine crying for her dear papa in the Opera's chapel. He felt strangely pulled towards that boy. He already knew that he could love this child, that he hoped to become a friend, rather than just a teacher to the little musician.

Erik listened for another minute or so, and when he thought he had figured out the way the boy would continue, he put his violin to his chin and began to play. For a few seconds the boy's voice and the sound of Erik's violin intertwined, then the boy stopped singing and stared up in shock. The child was about to jump up and run, when Erik's melodious tenor voice softly asked, "Why did you stop singing?"

Rico nervously looked at the tall stranger. "I...," he stammered. "I am sorry, Signore, I was not aware, I did not want to intrude... "

"I think I am the one who must apologize," Erik replied. "For interrupting your beautiful song. But when I heard you, I felt the need to play my violin myself, to participate in the music." Then, almost as an afterthought, he added, "what was it that you were singing? I have never heard that song before..."

Rico hesitated. He had been told to be wary of strangers, but somehow he was not afraid of this man. He even felt a certain kinship with him. After all, that stranger played the violin perfectly, and he had been able to follow his own improvised song on his instrument, he even mentioned a pull towards music... was it possible that this man might be able to understand this strange need that sometimes overcame him, to express himself in music?

"It is not really a song," Rico explained. "It is just a melody that I felt inside me..."

Erik nodded, putting his violin down, but making sure the boy could still only see his undamaged left profile. "I know that feeling," he confessed, "sometimes a melody is forming in my mind and it wants to get out and I have to play it or sing it and write it down."

Rico's eyes widened. That was exactly the way his song had started this morning! That man really understood! "I always sing, when I have a melody inside me," he stated. "I cannot play and I do not know how to write it down."

Erik beamed. The conversation was going exactly the way he wanted it to. "I could show you how to write down music," he suggested. "Or teach you how to play. Right now I only have the violin with me, but my friend is currently buying furniture and he will also purchase a piano..."

Rico grinned with joy. "I would love that!" he said, then frowned. "I have never seen you before. Do you live here?" he asked.

Erik sat down underneath the almond tree and gestured to Rico to sit down again as well. By keeping a suitable distance he made sure that the boy did not feel threatened, while at the same time he could keep his mask out of the child's line of vision. "My friend and I rented this house a few days ago," he explained. "It is almost empty, so he is looking for the necessary furniture as I just told you. He will join me in a few days, once he has purchased everything we need."

Rico nodded in understanding. "And you came today to just have a look around, clean it up a bit, do some repair work?" He frowned as he remembered something. "It was you!" He exclaimed excitedly. "Matteo's nonna told us the other day that this house must be haunted, for she had been lying awake at night because her arthritis had been so painful, when she heard eerie, ghostly sounds coming from that direction. That was you, was it not? Playing your violin? Did you feel a melody forming inside you as well that you needed to express?"

Erik nodded. "That must have been me," he admitted. "I have been here for a few days, cleaning up, repairing, as you thought, and one night..."

Rico beamed with excitement. There finally was somebody who understood this strange urge to give voice to a nameless melody that suddenly was inside your head! "I am glad that you are here now," he said. "That you understand. The other children don't." He shrugged. "They do like singing, but only songs that they have been taught. They do not have melodies in them that they want to sing. Need to sing. They would think I am crazy if I suddenly started singing a new melody like I just did. That's why I came here," he added, blushing. "Because I thought I would be alone and could sing..." He shyly looked over to where Erik was sitting. "You do not mind?" he asked nervously. "I mean, since you live here now, I should not have come..."

Erik laughed. "I do not mind," he assured the boy. "I am glad you came here," he added, "because that way we could meet. How else would I have known that you are a musician as well?"

Rico nodded. That made sense. "I am glad I know that you also have music inside you," he said. "If I had met you in the streets I would not know, right?"

A shadow passed over Erik's face. "I don't go out very often," he stated casually, "who knows how long it would have taken for the two of us to get acquainted if you had not come here today." Then he remembered something the boy had said. "Your friends do not understand your music," he continued, "what about your parents? Surely they do understand?" The boy was a musical genius, surely somebody in his family must have some understanding for his talents? He must have inherited his talent from someone?

Rico shook his head. "Mamma does love music fine," he stated, "though it does make her sad often, but she sings beautifully. She is in the choir of the Opera house," he informed the stranger proudly, "but she only sings what she has to for her job. She never has any melodies in her head. Maybe papa would have understood," he added sadly, "mamma always says he was such a great musician..."

Erik curiously looked at the boy. "What about your father?" he asked. He wondered, had the man abandoned his family, or was he dead?

Tears began welling in Rico's eyes again. "He died," he murmured. "My papa is dead."

Erik felt relief wash through him. As bad as it was that the boy had only one parent left, the knowledge that the child's father had not abandoned this talented child and his mother somehow comforted him. The idea that a father could abandon such a precious little darling had been disconcerting. Then he smiled. The child's father had died, presumably recently, just the way it had been with Christine, when he first met her. Why did this situation remind him so much of his lost love?

"I am sorry," he murmured, trying to sound comforting, "I am sure you miss him very much."

Rico shook his head, tears now freely running down his cheeks."I don't know," he sobbed miserably, "I guess I do miss him. But it's more I wish I had met him." His voice dropped to a whisper. "He died before I was born," he added sadly.

Erik stared at the boy. "Mine too," he murmured. "I never met my father either. He also died a few months before I was born."

Rico looked up in astonishment. There was something else he and this man had in common. "Did it hurt?" he asked. "Did you always wish he were there and you could know him? Did your mamma tell you how wonderful he had been, while crying?"

Erik thought about it for a moment. Had he missed his father when he had been a child? He was not sure. Would his father have loved him despite his ugliness or would he have treated him the same way his mother had? "I don't know," he said after a while. "I never thought about it. It is... my childhood was not a happy one," he tried to explain.

Rico nodded. "Was your mamma also crying most of the time, because your papa had died?" he asked. "I do love her very much, but it always makes me so sad when she cries..."

Erik stared ahead. He did not want to think about his own childhood right now, about the abuse he had suffered at the hands of his mother. "I don't think she cried often," he finally managed to say. "Though I probably would not know about it anyway. I was not allowed to be around her very much. I had to stay in my room in the attic."

"Why?" Rico's eyes were round with surprise now. "Did she not want to play with you, was she not happy that your papa had at least left her a son when he died?"

Erik winced. "No," he said curtly. "I was a disappointment for her. She had wanted a different kind of child, handsome, normal..." He interrupted himself, realizing that he had alluded to his disfigurement.

"Was it your music?" Rico hesitantly asked. "Did she think you were not normal, because you had songs in your head?"

Erik shrugged. "Maybe," he said vaguely. Under no circumstances would he share his curse with this boy, nor the pain he had endured as a consequence.

Rico nodded. "I am not sure my mamma understands that either," he admitted, "but she loves me anyway. She is proud of me and says I remind her of my father..."

Erik sighed. To judge from the boy's height he must be around five years old, if his father had died before his birth, the mother must be widowed close to six years by now, and apparently she still loved her dead husband. "Such devotion is rare," he thought, "but then, I can understand it perfectly, I cannot forget my Christine either..." Aloud he said, "it must be hard for your mother that your father died."

Rico nodded. "It makes her very sad, and I understand. I mean, if she died, I would also be sad for the rest of my life."

Erik closed his eyes. "Yes," he whispered, "it takes the sunshine out of your life to lose a loved one..."

Rico shuddered. There was something so utterly sad and devastating in the stranger's voice as he said that. Was it possible that he had lost loved ones, too? "Your mamma," he whispered. "Is she dead as well? Does that make you so sad?"

Erik shook his head. "She is dead," he admitted," but that's not who I was thinking of. My family..."

Rico suddenly realized that the stranger must be around the same age as his friend Carlo's father. "Family?" he asked. "You had a wife and children, and they are dead?"

Erik sighed. For some reason this encounter kept reminding him of Christine. "I had a girl that I wanted to marry," he told the boy, "and a sister..."

"And they died?" Rico asked, his voice full of compassion.

"They … disappeared," Erik stated, unwilling to elaborate further.

Rico's eyes were round like saucers now. That was exciting. "Were they kidnapped?" he asked. "Did the police look for them?"

Erik had to laugh despite the pain in his heart. "They moved without leaving their new address," he explained. "My friend and I tried to find them, but we couldn't."

"Did she not want to marry you?" Rico asked curiously. "Did she run away?"

Erik closed his eyes. How many times had he asked himself the same question? Had Christine really intended to keep her word and marry him? Had she meant it when she told him she loved him, after she had allowed him to take her virginity? In the throes of passion that night he had been so sure that she did indeed love him, but what if he had been mistaken? What if she had come to her senses later and realized that she had given herself to a monster? Would she not have felt deeply ashamed of what she had done? Sullied even? Was that the reason why she had left Paris, to get away from the place of her shame and humiliation?

"I... I don't know," he whispered. "I thought she wanted to marry me, but... after she disappeared..."

"And your sister?" Rico asked. "She went with that girl? She left you as well without telling you where she went?" He shook his head. "That was not nice of her. Of both of them. They can't have liked you very much." He was glad that his family was different. His mamma loved him, and so did his nonna and zia Rita. They would not leave one day without telling him where they were going and never come back.

Erik sighed. "However that may be," he added, "at least they are together, so neither of them is alone."

Rico did not find that thought very comforting. "That was mean of them," he said, "to leave you. Even if they could not understand your music, they should not have disappeared like that. Well, maybe that girl. Though if she did not want to marry you, she could have just said so. But your sister should have stayed. A family needs to be together, and especially since your parents are both dead, you and your sister should have stuck together." He paused. "What is it like to have a sister?" he asked. "I do not have any siblings..."

Erik winced. He should not have mentioned Antoinette, nor Christine, for that matter. The boy was jumping to assumptions, but there was no way he could explain things to the child. The horrors of his past were not meant for the ears of a sensitive, musically talented young boy.

"It is hard to explain," Erik finally mumbled. "My sister... it's not quite as you think, but it's a long and complex story, and you are too young for it anyway. The only thing I can tell you right now is that I love her very much, both, her and my... fiancée, and that I miss them."


	15. Fist Steps

Hi everybody, thank you soooo much for reading, for the kind reviews, for adding to your favorites or putting on alert! To guest reviewer Paula: Since you asked, in the top right-hand corner you find the options to "Login" or "Sign Up". The latter is the one you want to click on for registering with the site. I hope that helps!

And now the dreaded, bad news: There won't be an update next weekend, since little me is on vacation and I won't have the time to write another chapter. Does it help if I promise the next chapter will be worth the wait? Please, please, say so! We are getting awfully close to the fluffy part of this fic!

Anyway, no ownership, blah, blah, yada, yada, you know the routine. Now let's see what our two Eriks are up to!

Chapter 15 - First Steps

The conversation was interrupted by the chimes of the bells from the village church, announcing that it was twelve noon. Rico quickly jumped to his feet. "I must go home now," he informed Erik. "My family will be waiting for me with lunch."

Erik reluctantly agreed. "In that case, I won't keep you any longer," he told his new friend. "But think about what I told you before, that I could teach you how to play a violin or write down the songs in your head. It would be my pleasure to help you with your music!"

Rico nodded. "I would really love to learn all that, but I will also have to tell mamma about this," he explained. "She needs to give permission."

Erik sighed. That was the tricky part. How likely was it that any mother would allow her son to take lessons from a disfigured, masked freak? And this was a widow's only child. Would she not be even more protective about her boy than normal mothers? What if she did not allow him to befriend the child, to teach him all he himself knew about music?

"Of course you must ask your mother for permission," he growled annoyed. "But maybe you think about it first. If you decide that this is what you really want," - of which Erik had no doubt - "then your mother might grant her permission more easily. I mean, you will be much more convincing, if she realizes you have given this some thought and it is not a passing fancy of yours to learn more about music."

Rico nodded. He kind of understood what the stranger said and he agreed that a lot would depend on the way how he presented this to his mamma. It was probably best not to rush things, to gradually introduce her to his wish to take lessons with his new friend. Maybe it was best to wait till his mamma had actually met that talented musician. She did have some understanding for music too, surely she would like the new neighbor?

"I will think about it," Rico finally promised. "But I won't be able to tell you right away. I may not even come back for a few days. You are probably busy anyway what with moving in and all that," he added. "And my friends would miss me if I came to see you every day... I mean, once we can start our lessons, I won't have as much time to play with them as I do now, so I'd better, you know, play with them now.."

Erik nodded in understanding. Maybe it _was_ better if the boy did not come back immediately the next day, or anytime soon, not before he had perfected his rubber mask...

"You are right, I am rather busy at the moment," he therefore told Rico. "A lot of work needs to be done before this will be a comfortable home. But feel free to stop by, whenever you sense a new melody within you, that you want to express! I may not have time to come out and join you, as I did today, but I will always enjoy hearing your songs."

Rico beamed. He could still use the garden to give sound to his emotions. He might not be as alone there anymore as he used to be, but there would be a kindred spirit listening to his songs, which was probably even better.

"Till next time, then," he told Erik, then he was on his way.

Erik followed him with his eyes, wanting nothing more than that the boy could have stayed and they could have talked more, maybe even started their first lesson. Who knew what this child could do with a violin if properly taught? Yes, it would be good to have a student again, somebody to teach and to guide, and this little boy Rico had really touched his heart in many ways. Years ago, when he had still hoped to win Christine's love, he had allowed himself to dream of a family, with Christine by his side as his wife and maybe a little child or two... Though, if truth be told, this dream could probably not have come true, even if Christine had not disappeared. Considering his own hideousness, he knew that it would not have been wise to risk imparting such a curse on a child. No, Erik knew that he would never have children of his own, but maybe teaching this adorable little urchin would be the next-best thing. Deep in thoughts he went back into the house and began putting together a list of items he would need in order to work on his rubber mask. Then he exited the property on the side farthest away from the next neighbor and walked all the way towards the next village, where he posted his list to Nadir and Darius. With a bit of luck, he could have those things the next night. Then he could start trying to make himself look presentable enough for Rico's family to permit those lessons, that both, him and the child, craved.

Xxx

When Rico arrived home, he only found his grandmother. "Where are mamma and zia Rita?" he asked. "I am not that late that they would have left for the Opera already!"

Mme. Giry, who had become the boy's grandmother the same way she saw herself as Christine's foster mother, smiled. "No, sweetheart, not that late, though still not in time. But Signor Vantrotto was going to Turin anyway, and asked them if they wanted a ride. That way, your mother and aunt will have time to do some much-needed shopping in town, before they have to get ready for tonight's performance. You missed them by only a few minutes. If you had been home by twelve noon, as you are supposed to, you could have said good-bye to them."

Rico hung his head. "I am sorry for being late, nonna,," he mumbled contritely. "I was not paying attention to the time..."

Mme. Giry smiled. The boy really was a blessing to all of them. He usually was reliable to be home at the right time, and she knew from the expression of his little face that he truly was sorry. "He might look a lot like Erik, and he definitely has inherited his father's talent," she thought, "but luckily, his temper is more that of his mother. He really is a combination of the best characteristics of these two. What a pity that Erik could not meet him!"

Aloud she said, "I guess it can happen on occasion that one forgets the time over something exciting. But now, quick, wash your hands, young man, lunch is ready." Rico immediately darted to the bathroom, to do as ordered, and when he returned, there was a huge plate of his favorite pasta waiting for him.

The boy began to dig into his lunch. After a while, he casually observed. "By the way, nonna, that huge house at the other side of the village, you know, with that large garden, that has been abandoned for so long, there are people there now."

Mme. Giry gave him a surprised look. "How do you know that, Rico?" she asked.

Rico shrugged. "I met this gentleman," he confessed, not going into details, about how Erik had caught him trespassing. "He said he and his friend have rented the house."

Mme. Giry was surprised. "I have not seen any strangers around here recently," she said. "'Nor have I heard that any of my friends in the village have."

Rico nodded. "They are too busy right now to go out," he explained. "The gentleman I met is cleaning up the house and doing some repair work, and his friend is staying at an inn in Turin for the moment. He is buying furniture and stuff, and it is more convenient to stay in town for that. I guess, once everything is fine, they will have more time to go out and meet the neighbors."

Mme. Giry hesitated. She was not entirely happy with the fact that the boy had talked to somebody she did not know. "Did the gentleman introduce himself to you?" she asked, slightly nervous. "Do you know his name?"

Rico shook his head. Only now did it occur to him that he had forgotten to ask his new friend for his name. "I don't know," he admitted, knowing that it was definitely not wise to mention anything about the stranger's offer to teach him music right now. Maybe this would have to wait till his family had actually met the man.

"He can play the violin, though," he added, happy to be able to provide some information on the new resident. "Do you remember, when Matteo's nonna said that house must be haunted because she heard music coming from that direction in the middle of the night? That was him playing."

Mme. Giry felt relief. In her opinion, musicians were not inherently bad people. Surely, no truly malicious person could appreciate music?

Rico frowned. He suddenly remembered something else. "The gentleman must be coming from a different region of Italy," he told her. "He spoke in a funny way, he sounded almost like that family from Rome that passed through the village last fall."

Mme. Giry was not sure what to make of this information. If the new tenant of the house in question was coming from that far away and nobody had hears about his arrival yet, he most likely had no ties in the area. Why would somebody move from a huge city like Rome to a God-forsaken little village at the outskirts of Turin? Surely, there would be more chances for work for a musician in Rome? Or was that mysterious stranger maybe no musician, just somebody who played for his own pleasure whenever he found the time, like many Italians did? She shrugged. Sooner or later, the new neighbors would have to leave their house, frequent the shops in the village, and then she would meet them and be able to form her own opinion about them. For the moment, she accepted the information Rico had given her. Even though she was not thrilled by the fact that the boy had talked to a stranger, Rico seemed unharmed, and therefore there probably was no reason to get worried.

Xxxx

The very next night, Darius arrived at the house with all the items Erik had asked for. To his delight, Erik looked even more animated than the last time he had seen him. Their 'boy' had definitely changed for the better. He obviously had a goal now, a purpose in life. "My master will be so glad to hear, how much improved master Erik is," he thought. In fact, Darius and Nadir, the two lonely old men, had kind of adopted Erik into their hearts over the long period of his slow recovery. Darius never had had a family, and Nadir's family had long died, so their dormant fatherly instincts had awoken when the gravely injured and brokenhearted younger man needed their help. Nadir had always had a soft spot for Erik but the latter had always been so aloof and intimidating, that Nadir had not dared openly show him his love. That had changed, once they had brought a half-dead Erik to their home. Now Erik needed them, and once he regained consciousness and they realized the extent of his emotional pain, both men had showered him with love. It was mostly thanks to their loving care that Erik had survived and overcome his depression. And even though neither would dare mention it in front of Erik, the two old men had come to think of Erik as "our boy".

"I met the child, Darius!" Erik announced cheerfully. "He sang again in the garden. He is every bit as amazing as I thought he would be. You should see him!"

Darius nodded in a dignified manner, smiling at the thought how having a protégé could raise one's spirits. "I certainly will, one day," he commented, "once the master and I have moved here. When do you want us to come? The master is pretty much done with the purchase of suitable furniture."

Erik hesitated. "Give me a few more days," he then said. "I want to get that rubber mask done first, so that I can meet the child again, before introducing him to the two of you. Since you are both tone-deaf, it might not further his trust in me, if he learns that I am friends with the likes of you," he added teasingly. "Also, once the house is obviously inhabited, we will have to go out and meet the villagers, and for that purpose I need my rubber mask. I will also have to talk to the boy's mother about teaching him. This might not be too easy, I just learned she is a widow, and Rico her only child. She may be a bit protective of the boy, especially when it comes to letting him associate with strangers..."

Darius nodded in understanding. "The master might have to tell her about how good you were with master Reza," he suggested.

Erik sighed. "Well, you two might actually complicate things with your presence," he said apologetically, knowing full well, how much his two friends missed him and how they were both counting the days till they could join him in their new home. "My Italian is good enough to pass myself off as a national. So even with my Roman dialect they will only see me as a stranger, not really as a foreigner. Though who knows, Italy has only been united for a few years, so maybe everybody not born in Piemonte-Sardegna is a foreigner to them. But you and Nadir..." he shook his head. "Nobody in their right mind would mistake the two of you for Italians. You are definitely foreigners, and that might make them wary of you, and thus of me, who is friends with you. I am very sorry, Darius, but please tell Nadir that I will need a bit more time alone here."

Darius nodded. Erik was right, of course. In a little village like this one, who would trust two middle-Eastern gentlemen? Winning the trust of the child's family was difficult enough for Erik considering his handicap and his resulting uneasiness around human beings. Their presence might certainly put his plan at risk, and the last thing Darius wanted to do was to cause Erik to fail in his endeavor to win that talented child as a new student and friend.

"I will inform the master accordingly," Darius promised, knowing full well that Nadir would not like that particular message. His master missed Erik dearly and had hoped to rejoin his protégé soon.

Xxxx

Erik spent the next two days and nights working on his rubber mask. When he finally was satisfied with his achievement he tried it on. Of course it would not bear close scrutiny in bright daylight, but it might do under the shadow of a tree, with his hat on, or in a dimly-lit shop. He felt confident that with this mask he could meet Rico again without scaring the boy away.

To his grand sorrow, almost another week passed, before the boy returned. As soon as Erik heard Rico sing, he joined him in the garden.

Once Rico spotted him, he interrupted his song and grinned at Erik, who now dared facing him fully. Thanks to the shadows Rico did not notice anything strange about Erik's face. "Are you soon finished with the tidying and repair?" Rico asked. "I told nonna that I met you, and she told mamma. I think they were not too happy that I had talked to a stranger like that." He looked down guiltily. "Though I did not tell them that I had entered your garden without permission, but I think they would be much more comfortable with our friendship if they could meet you, too."

Erik winced. He did not quite feel ready yet to meet the boy's family. Apparently there were no men. Apart from his mother, Rico only ever mentioned a grandmother, and occasionally an aunt. And while this meant that at least he would not have to face an angry male relative, this caused a whole different set of problems. How would a group of women react if somebody with a face that did not look quite right, befriended their little boy? Would they allow a man - any man for that matter - to gain influence on their boy? For obviously, the mother and grandmother were doting on Rico, probably the aunt as well, which was only too understandable, considering that his father was dead, and his mother did not seem interested in remarrying. The aunt seemed unmarried as well, so Rico was the only grandson and only nephew too, in addition to being an only child.

"There is a little bit more work that needs to be done," Erik hesitantly explained. "Also, I have to decide what to do with the garden. In a way, it is nice the way it is, but then, the trees would bear much more fruit if they were properly pruned, and the rosebushes need more space to grow. I need to get rid of some of the weeds at least..."

Rico nodded. "It's a shame, though," he said, "I really like the garden the way it is."

"I know," Erik agreed, "but imagine, if I had enough peaches and almonds and whatever to give some to your mother and grandmother as well. Don't you think that would be a great way of making friends with them, so that they would grant permission for you to learn how to play an instrument and how to write down music?"

Rico beamed. "That would be great!" he admitted. Then his face fell. "But if you do something to the trees, you will have to wait at least another year, before you get more fruit. Must I wait that long before we can begin our lessons?"

Erik laughed. "Maybe not," he explained. "I think that one peach tree over there is doing pretty well even without pruning, and the peaches should be ripe in another two to three weeks. What do you think, shall we try to win your family's permission with a basket full of ripe fruit then?"

Rico nodded eagerly. He loved peaches, and he had already longingly watched the slowly ripening fruit on his favorite tree. If his new acquaintance used those to become friends with his family, he would get juicy peaches in addition to music lessons. Could life possibly get any better?


	16. Decisive Meeting

I am back! And here is the long-awaited update! There is light at the end of the tunnel for our family!

Thank you for reading, for putting on alert or adding to favorites, and a special thank you to all my reviewers! I never could do this without your support!

To paula, yes, I know that Rico is some sort of child prodigy, but then, he is Erik's son, right? And our dear Erik is a genius, so I think it is justified to have the son be a genius as well. ;-)

As you all know, I do not own anything or anybody. But it can't hurt to remind you...

Chapter 16 - Decisive Meeting

Two and a half weeks passed, while Erik and Rico were waiting for the peaches to become sweet and juicy. Rico stopped by regularly now, if only for a few minutes per day, to check on the peaches. He got more and more excited every day. Soon those delicious fruits would be ripe and he would get a whole basket full! And of course, the day his new friend took the peaches to his mother, he would hopefully get permission to study music with him. More often than not, he was optimistic about it, but sometimes he got a bit nervous. What if his mamma and nonna did not allow these lessons? What would he do then? What could he say to convince them that he not only wanted, but simply needed to learn these things? Would they understand how important this was to him? Could they be persuaded to let him study music with this new neighbor despite their caution towards strangers?

Even though he pretended to be confident about the outcome of his approaching meeting with Rico's family, Erik's thoughts went into the same direction. The closer the day got that the peaches would finally be ripe enough that he could use them to try and win the trust of the boy's family, the more agitated he got. Rico had completely won over his lonely heart and he knew that he needed a chance to have the child around regularly, to talk to him and teach him. If Rico's relatives could not be convinced that their little genius would profit tremendously from such lessons, or worse, if they as much as forbade the boy to see him ever again – which, given his disfigurement, was a situation that could easily arise – Erik felt he would not be able to survive such a blow. Teaching the boy would fill his miserable life with purpose, and he loved the little fellow dearly already. Losing him would be a tragedy almost as huge as losing Christine and Antoinette had been. Erik was certain that he would not be able to deal with yet another loss. Everything – his happiness, his life, his sanity – everything therefore depended on this first meeting with Rico's family. He simply had to make a positive impression on them, he simply had to. At all costs. But how did one impress a group of lonely females? How did one convince them to let their only son and grandson take music lessons from a complete stranger, who, on top of everything else, was also a freak of nature?

Erik sighed with frustration. He knew that he was not too experienced in interacting with other human beings. So far he had never been too interested in that area and the lack of social skills had not seemed too big a problem to him. But now, for the first time in his life, he wished he were an expert in the art of dealing with others, so that he would have no problems charming Rico's family and getting their permission for the lessons.

How easy things had been years ago, when he had taught Christine! There had been no family to get permission from. On the contrary, thanks to her father's stupid story of the Angel of Music, he had practically been able to convince Christine that he was teaching her at her father's request. And the girl's foster mother and guardian, Antoinette, had already known and trusted him and therefore never objected. And little Reza... Erik shook his head. No, whenever he had befriended a child before, the adults in charge had already known him. This was a completely different situation, and that made him nervous.

For a moment, Erik considered the possibility that Rico could maybe be convinced to come for lessons behind his family's back, should his relatives not give their consent to his studies, but he quickly dismissed that thought. No, he could not do that. He could not ask such a young child to betray his mother's and grandmother's trust in him. He had no right to come between the boy and his relatives. Even though it would break his heart to give up his hopes of teaching Rico, he could not resort to such practices.

But what could he do if his offer to teach Rico was rejected? Surely such a decision would hurt the boy as well. Could he therefore accept it? No, Erik shook his head. The child's talent really was unique. To ignore his potential and deny him proper training would be a crime against the boy. He therefore had to make absolutely sure these women understood that. If they seemed reluctant at first, he might have to give them more time, to allow them to know him a bit better. He groaned at the prospect of having to socialize with Rico's mother and grandmother for an indeterminate amount of time in order to win their trust and convince them to allow the lessons. Erik knew that his tolerance for any type of social gatherings was extremely low, but he vowed that for the boy's sake – and his own – he would endure whatever number of afternoon teas and morning visits it would take to win the trust of these two ladies. He decided he would even be willing to have one or both ladies present during their lessons, if that would make them more inclined to allow him to teach Rico, even though their presence would probably interfere with the boy's ability to concentrate on the subject.

Every day, both, Erik and Rico, checked on the peaches, Rico with great anticipation for both, the peaches and his future lessons, Erik with growing uneasiness and fear at the thought of the meeting with the boy's family, which would be such a decisive encounter for both of them. How much could go wrong then!

At the beginning of the third week, Rico stated that in his opinion the peaches were as ripe and delicious as they would ever get and that now was surely the time for his new friend to contact his mamma and nonna. "Will you walk me home today and bring mamma the peaches?" he asked one day. "I am sure she will be delighted about the fruit and once she has met you, she will see how nice you are and how much you know about music and will allow our lessons. Maybe we could start this very afternoon?"

Erik had to smile at Rico's enthusiasm, even though he dreaded the suggested meeting. As much as he had thought about this encounter over the past two weeks and rehearsed what he would say to Rico's family in order to get their permission, he did not feel ready for this confrontation yet. He therefore tried to stall for time. "I can't go today," he told Rico. "I have a few tasks to take care of. Tomorrow I am rather busy, too..."

Rico sighed. "Can't that wait?" he asked. "The peaches are not getting any better..."

Erik groaned. The peaches... the boy was right. He could not delay this much longer. Another day or two would not be a problem, but then they needed to be picked. Two days at the utmost... two more days to prepare himself for this dreadful meeting on which so much depended. He knew that he needed those days, at least two more, preferably another week, but two was the most he could get. Erik therefore capitulated. "Day after tomorrow," he promised. "I can't get away any sooner, but then we'll take this huge basket over there full of peaches to your mother and tell her about our plans for music lessons. How does that sound?"

Rico beamed. The basket Erik had indicated was indeed rather big. A large number of peaches would fit into it. "Day after tomorrow," he nodded. "I'll come over in the morning and help you pick them, then we can go together."

Erik nodded absentmindedly. What had he gotten himself into? It was final now. Rico had his word. In two days' time he would have to face the child's mother and grandmother and plead his cause with them. He shuddered at the thought of how much could go wrong.

"Shall I tell mamma that you will be coming with the peaches?" Rico's fresh voice interrupted Erik's brooding.

"Maybe not," Erik uttered feebly. "I think a surprise might be better for our purpose to gain her permission for lessons. Please don't... do not tell anybody that I will be stopping by..." Maybe, he thought, maybe that way I do not really have to go. If nobody expects my visit, I might be able to wait another day...

Suddenly he missed Nadir. If this meeting did not go as he hoped, if he was not allowed to teach the boy, he knew he would need comfort. And if things went well, if indeed the mother could be convinced to let Rico study music with him, then he would want to celebrate. Yes, no matter what the outcome, he would need Nadir by his side. He would ask his friend to finally move into the house with him the day of his meeting with Rico's family. If he hurried he could make it to the post office in the neighboring village in time too send a note to Nadir, asking him to join him in two days' time.

Erik turned to Rico. "In two days, as I said. Now I must get to work. My friend will be arriving shortly and I still have a lot to prepare. He will also have the furniture delivered that he bought, including the piano, so this will be a very busy week..."

Rico understood. "I'll go then," he said. "I won't be in your way. And I will be back day after tomorrow for the peaches!"

Erik groaned. He was so not looking forward to what would be happening in two days. As soon as Rico had left him, he sat down and wrote a lengthy letter to Nadir, explaining the situation. "I know there is no point in delaying meeting the family much longer," he finished, "but from my past experiences with humanity, I have a feeling as if this might be going terribly wrong. Nadir, I need you there, when I come home from this all-decisive meeting. I need you to help me deal with whatever that day will bring. If I cannot convince the mother to let me teach her son... Oh Nadir, I do not want to even think about it. I have grown so fond of the little fellow, that the thought of not being allowed to see him regularly any more, the mere thought of this possibility is almost killing me!"

Once Erik had finished his letter, he quickly walked to the next village to post it. After the letter was on its way, he calmed down a bit. Nadir would come, of that he was certain. So even if the worst happened and Rico's mother forbade him to see her son in the future, he would not be alone. Nadir and Darius would be there to comfort him. They had provided their support during the most tragic event of his life, the loss of his beloved Christine and his foster sister Antoinette, they would hopefully be able to get him over yet another loss. Erik suddenly felt warm inside at the thought of the two old men that loved him despite his face and his past and were sometimes almost suffocating him with their love. It would be good to have them around again.

Xxxx

Two days later, Rico arrived at Erik's garden early in the morning, ready to climb on the tree and pick the ripest peaches. The boy was very excited. The big day had finally arrived. Today he would get the long-awaited peaches and today his friend would talk to his mother about the music lessons. He prayed that she would give her permission, but then,why would she not? After all, music was important to her as well, she was a singer, and she always said that his dear papa had been such a wonderful musician, too, and that it had been music what had brought them together. Surely, she would want that he, Rico, learned everything there was to learn about music as well?

Erik was not half as calm as he would have wanted to be, but he tried his best to hide his nervousness. He had resigned himself to get this over and done with as soon as possible. An answer – any answer – was better than his current uneasiness. Whatever the outcome of this meeting, at least he would know where he stood with Rico's family.

Erik therefore greeted the boy warmly, trying not to dwell on the thought what the next hour might bring with regards to his continued friendship with the child. "Good that you are here already," he told Rico. "We can start filling this basket with peaches. I'd rather go and meet your mother as soon as possible, so that I can be back home, when Nadir arrives later today."

Rico frowned. "Nadir?" he asked. "What a strange name. Is that your friend?"

Erik nodded. "Yes, that is my friend. I know his name sounds strange to you, that's because he is not Italian. He was born in Persia. The name is fairly common there."

Rico was intrigued. "Your friend is a foreigner?" he asked. "How did you meet him? Has he told you stories about his country? Does he live here in Italy now or is he just here for a visit with you?"

Erik smiled. "Nadir did not have to tell me anything about his home country, for I lived there for a while many years ago. That's how I met him."

"Oh!" Rico was awe-struck. "What is it like there? Was it beautiful to live there?"

"No." Erik's voice was as cold as ice. "It was a nightmare of violence and blood. That's why I returned, and Nadir and his servant left as well." He turned to Rico and added apologetically, "forgive me if I scared you, but I wish I could forget that time in Persia. I wish with all my heart I could erase those memories from my mind."

Rico was not quite sure what could possibly have been so terrible about a country, but he realized that Erik was serious, that he did not want to be reminded of those times. "I won't ask you again," he promised. "Nor your friend Signor Nadir."

Erik nodded, and the two concentrated on the peaches. Soon they had filled the basket with the ripe fruit. Erik breathed in deeply as he picked up the full basket. That was it now, the point of no return. In a short time the decision would be made, soon he would know if he could teach Rico.

"Let's go," Erik mumbled, trying to sound strong and decisive. "Lead the way, Rico, I do not know where you live!"

Rico excitedly ran ahead, showing Erik the shortest way to his home, across the meadows, Erik followed with the basket of peaches. After about a ten minutes walk they arrived at a lovely little house with a small garden in front. Everything looked very tidy and well-kept. Rico opened the front door. "Mamma," he cried, "nonna! Zia Rita! Where are you?"

"Rico!" Erik heard a woman's voice. "What is it? Why are you back so soon? Are you not playing with your friends today?"

At the sound of this voice Erik almost fainted. Was he hallucinating? Dreaming? Or was he the victim of some strange sound effect? For that woman's voice sounded exactly the way his Christine's sweet voice had sounded. But what would Christine do here with Rico's family? Surely, it must be some strange coincidence that he thought he had heard her voice here in this place, coming from Rico's home. But he decided that it probably was a good omen that something here reminded him of his lost love. Maybe this meeting would go well after all.

Hesitantly, Erik followed Rico into the house. He saw Rico in the arms of a young woman dressed in black, presumably the boy's mother. Erik could not see the woman's face, since she was bending down to embrace her child. He felt awkward to walk in on this family moment between mother and son, but knew that he must make his presence known. He cleared his throat. "Forgive the intrusion, Signora," he addressed her politely, "but my young friend Rico hopes you will accept these peaches from my garden..."

At the sound of his voice the woman stood up abruptly, staring at him, her eyes wide open as if in shock. She put both her hands on her heart, as if to force it not to break with joy, and a gurgling sound emerged from her mouth. "Angel?"

Erik gasped. It was her. It really was her. His Christine. There she stood in front of him, she, who he had tried so hard to find and who had been impossible to locate. Paler than he remembered her and possibly even thinner, but just as beautiful as ever. The black dress made her seem even paler and her eyes looked even bigger in that beloved white face.

"Christine," he whispered, automatically setting down the basket with the peaches. For a moment the two stood there, staring at each other, trying to control an onslaught of emotions, forgetting everything around them, including the boy, then Christine began to shake.

"Angel," her lips formed the word again, but no sound escaped her mouth. She stared at him as if she thought she was imagining things or going mad. This could not be, or could it? Overwhelmed by a multitude of emotions Christine fainted. Erik caught her just in time, before she hit the hard floor and gently laid her down on the couch.


	17. Reunited

First of all, thank you for reading, putting on alert or adding to favorites, and especially for all the lovely reviews! I am not sure what you guys will say to this chapter if the previous one warranted so many "YAY"s!

But it appears you liked the fact that our two lovebirds finally met again! Now let's see how the family reunion goes, or rather, part 1 of it ;-)

Just to make sure everybody knows, I do not own anything or anybody. No, unfortunately I am not the great-great-granddaughter of Leroux or something like that, therefore no rights to these characters :-(

Note: Since I used the fire at the Opéra, I am also using the year given in the movie. It starts in 1870, but the Masquerade marks the new year, hence 1871. Assuming they rushed "Don Juan Triumphant" since they were so eager to catch the Phantom, the fateful performance and fire probably took place in mid to late February, thus allowing a few weeks for rehearsals, costume and set design. 9 months later would therefore be November, as has already been established in this story as Rico's month of birth...

Chapter 17 - Reunited

"What is wrong with her?" Rico's voice was strained. He seemed scared and worried about his mother's sudden weakness. "Will she be fine?"

Erik nodded, the child barely registering with him, all his thoughts concentrating on the miracle that he was once again holding his Christine in his arms. "Yes, she should be fine in a moment," he mumbled, while lovingly caressing Christine's face and putting a stray curl behind her ear, "but please, Rico, could you step out into the garden for a while? I need to talk to her. Alone."

"Yes." Rico was baffled. What was going on here? His mamma had been strong and healthy just a few minutes ago, now she was lying lifelessly on the couch, and his new friend was suddenly so distant, as if he had completely forgotten about his, Rico's, presence. Deeply worried and confused the child followed Erik's request and left the two adults alone.

Xxxx

Christine was dreaming. It was her favorite dream, the one she had every couple of months. She dreamed that her beloved Angel was not really dead, that he had somehow survived the attack of the mob, and that he came to her so that they could finally get married. The circumstances varied every time she had that dream, but the fact that her Angel would come to her, embrace her and kiss her, always remained the same. The dream had never been so realistic, before, though.

Christine sighed. She could feel her Angel's strong arms around her, holding her, his fingers caressing her, almost as if he really were there. And his voice! Never before had she heard his voice so clearly in her dreams, his soft whisper, begging her to wake up and look at him, promising her that now that he had found her again, everything would be fine. She almost did as he asked and opened her eyes, then she remembered that this was a dream and that the illusion would be gone, once she woke up. She would be lying on her bed or the couch, alone, as she always did, when she woke from that dream. No, she could not open her eyes, she could not risk waking up, this dream was too sweet, this feeling of lying in her Angel's arms again, listening to his melodious voice whispering words of love into her ear.

Christine even could smell his cologne. How she had missed that masculine scent of his! She suddenly sat bolt upright. She had never heard of anybody dreaming about scents. Why could she now smell her Angel? What kind of dream was this?

"My Christine, my love, please wake up," Erik cooed, "my light, my sunshine, your Erik wants to see your wonderful eyes look at him with love and longing. The time of mourning is over, now that I have found you again, we are finally together again!" He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed the ring she was wearing, the ring he had given to her after their love-making.

Cautiously, Christine finally decided to open one eye. This dream was too unusual, and her curiosity was piqued. She gasped. She looked right into her Angel's eyes, that were gazing upon her adoringly.

"Are you real?" she whispered, clutching at Erik's lapels. "Oh my God, let this not be a dream! Or if this is a dream, let me never wake up again!"

"Sh, my darling," Erik whispered, while pulling her into a close embrace. "I am as real as you are. I have finally found you again. Oh Christine, I missed you so much! How could you leave Paris like that, without leaving any trace! I have tried so hard to find you!"

"They said you were dead," Christine explained. "Everybody said you were dead. People we knew were no liars said they had seen you die. Slain by the mob..." Her eyes filled with tears at the memory of those terrible days in Paris, when everybody had been rejoicing about the Phantom's slow and painful death. "At first I did not believe them, you had promised you would come for me, maybe not the first night, but surely the one after that, but when you did not come..." Her voice trailed and her hands reached for Erik, needing to touch him, to make sure he was real.

"Your face," she begged, "let me see your face, let me see that you are really there, that it is you and not a figment of my imagination." She grabbed the seam of his new mask and ripped it off. Erik winced, that mask was very tight fitting and the quick removal somewhat irritated his sensitive skin underneath, but he did not complain.

"Oh Angel," Christine sobbed, glancing adoringly at his now exposed, deformed features. "Where were you? Why did you not come for me if it was all a lie and you were not really dead? I was waiting for you, praying for you to be safe. It hurt so much to think of you dead, beaten to death by those enraged citizens."

Erik sighed. "I very nearly died," he told her. "And I am sure the members of the mob thought they had finished me off. At any rate, they left me to die, beaten, injured, bleeding..."

Christine clung to him. "They hurt you," she sobbed. "That was the worst, to think that you had suffered excruciating pain before you died, that they had not killed you quickly but drawn it out to make you suffer as much as possible..."

Erik smiled at her. "I lost consciousness fairly early on," he tried to reassure her, "when they hit me on my head. I do not remember too much of my ordeal. But to judge from the number of injuries I sustained that night, they must have spent quite some time hurting me, trying to kill me as slowly as humanly possible."

Christine wrapped her arms around him. "My poor Angel," she cried. "I wish I could have spared you this. How could they be so cruel! How could they treat you like that!"

"I guess I deserved some punishment for killing Piangi, setting the Opéra Populaire on fire and thus putting the lives of everybody inside at risk," Erik admitted sheepishly.

"That was all my fault," Christine sobbed into his shirt. "I drove you to extremes, because I was too scared to admit even to myself how much I loved you!"

"Sh, don't cry, my love," Erik tried to calm her. "It is over now, I am well again, I am not in pain anymore and we are together again." He lovingly kissed the top of her head.

Christine nodded. "You are alive," she muttered, "and you are here now, that is all that matters." She looked up at him, their eyes met, and slowly Erik lowered his lips to join hers in the first kiss since their night of passion. At first their mouths cautiously moved against each other, then lips parted, granting access to their tongues and soon they were voraciously devouring one another, forgetting everything around them.

Xxxx

"Why is the front door open? What's the matter here?" Mme. Giry was coming home from the butcher's shop. She entered the living room to check if no thief had broken into the house in her absence and stopped dead in her tracks, when she found Christine sitting in a man's lap, kissing him passionately. "Rina!" A shocked exclamation escaped her throat.

Startled, the couple on the couch broke apart, jumped to their feet and looked towards her. "Antoinette!" Erik grinned at his foster sister, extending one arm to her.

"Erik?" Mme. Giry stared at him uncomprehendingly. "Erik? Is this really you?"

Christine ran towards her foster mother and threw herself into Mme. Giry's arms. "Oh mamma, my Angel is alive, and God has brought him back to me!" she sobbed.

"Erik," Mme. Giry repeated, still unable to process the fact that her protégé whom she had always loved like a younger brother, was standing there in front of her, alive and well.

"It is really me, Antoinette," Erik reassured her. "I did survive that night, though just barely. That's why I could not contact the two of you and let you know, and when I was better, you were gone without a trace."

He hugged her. "I am so glad to have found the two of you again," he said. "You are all the family I have ever had. Antoinette, you have always been like a sister to me, and Christine is my fiancée."

Mme. Giry hugged him back. "Oh Erik, I still have troubles believing it that you are alive, but I am so happy for you and Christine. Thinking you dead has been so hard on her!"

Erik led both ladies back to the couch, where the three of them sat down together, Erik in the middle, one arm around each of them, pulling them close, needing to feel their presence, to assure himself that his sister and fiancée were truly once again by his side.

"But how..?" Mme. Giry asked. "We heard you were dead. How did you escape the mob and survive, and why did you not contact us immediately to let us know you were alive? Erik, we might have never found each other again!"

Erik sighed. "I know," he admitted. "I could not contact you, because I was between life and death for many weeks. You see, I did not escape the mob. The tales you heard were all true. They did beat me and abuse me, probably for hours, until they finally decided that enough was enough and left me for dead."

Mme. Giry paled hearing about Erik's ordeal and Christine buried her face in his chest. "How...?" she asked.

"Nadir found me," Erik simply stated. "He went to look for my body to give me a decent burial despite the fact that the building was declared unstable and dangerous. He risked his own life to salvage my body."

Christine and Antoinette smiled at the thought of the Persian rescuing Erik. "Christine wanted to go in as well," Antoinette explained, "but I would not let her. I thought it was too dangerous. I did not want to lose her too."

Erik nodded. "I am glad you did not go look for me, Christine," he said, smiling at her. "You would have been at grave risk in that hazardous building, and you would not have been able to carry me out anyway. I would have been too heavy for you ladies. As it is, it was hard enough for Nadir and his servant Darius to bring me to their home safely."

"Blessed be his soul," Antoinette exclaimed. "It did occur to me once that maybe you had somehow contacted him, but I did not remember his address and the piece of paper you had scribbled it on for me was kept in my room at the Opéra where it burned to ashes, so I could not get in touch with him."

Erik nodded. "And he did not contact you, because he did not want to give you false hope." He smiled at Christine. "Nadir could not know about our engagement yet, but," he looked at Antoinette, "he knew that you would want to know about my survival. It was just... I was only just barely alive when he found me. He feared I would not live through the night. Therefore he wanted to wait with contacting you until my fate was decided. He did not see much reason to tell you I was still alive only to have me die on you within the next hour. Since I was unconscious and in the throes of fever, nothing would have been accomplished by dragging you to my bedside anyway."

Christine and Antoinette both winced at the idea of Erik having been that ill. "But once you were better," Christine asked gently. "Why did he not contact mamma as soon as you were out of danger?"

Erik sighed. "He did try, but it was too late then. You had left Paris by then without a trace."

Christine and Antoinette looked at each other uncomprehendingly. "That was several weeks later," Christine whispered. "Surely you are not saying that...?"

Erik nodded. "My condition was critical for weeks on end. Nadir was about to give up hope, when I finally did regain full consciousness, and by then my ladies were gone."

He suddenly remembered something. "Where is your daughter, Antoinette? Is Meg not with you?"

Mme. Giry smiled. "Rita – I mean, Meg, but everybody here calls her Rita – is with us as well. She went to town this morning to buy a few things that we can't get in this little village. She should be back anytime soon."

Then she grinned at Christine. "What about our boy? Where is Rico? Does he know already?"

Christine looked around. She remembered that Rico had been here, just before her Angel had entered the room, but he was nowhere to be seen now. In truth, she had not even thought about him, since the moment she had awoken in her Angel's arms from what she had thought was a dream. "He was here earlier," she said, "but must have gone out again. Maybe he joined his friends for a game?"

Erik frowned. Rico! He had completely forgotten about the boy. It was obvious that the child was living with his ladies, but how had they ended up with him? Had they been as impressed with Rico's musical talent as he was and adopted him somehow?

"I... Rico was with me," he stammered, confused. "I made his acquaintance a while ago and noticed his musical talent."

Antoinette smiled. "He told me a few weeks ago about having met a new neighbor," she said. "The man that has rented that abandoned house with the large garden at the other end of the village and who could play the violin perfectly. Was that you, Erik?"

Erik nodded. "That was me. In fact, I asked him to introduce me to his family today, so that I could offer them to give the boy music lessons, that's how I came here..."

Christine and Antoinette smiled at each other. What a coincidence that Erik had already met his son and was eager to teach him!

"But then I recognized Christine and she fainted when she saw me," Erik continued, "and..." He barely remembered. The boy had said something and he had answered, but he had been too preoccupied with his unconscious Christine to pay much attention to the child at that moment. "I think I sent him out," he finally added. "I wanted to be alone with Christine when she would come to."

Christine looked pleadingly at her foster mother. "Will you go and look for him for me? Please? I want to tell him the wonderful news!"

Erik panicked. "Let me put on my mask first," he reminded the two ladies of his bare face. "I do not want to scare the child!"

Christine laughed. "For today you may, but in the future you must learn to show him your true face, especially if you want to teach him. Remember, how much heartbreak we caused each other, because a certain Angel of Music did not dare to tell me the truth about himself right from the start? How much easier things might have been for us if my beloved teacher had not been hiding behind walls for so long? I therefore insist that you won't be hiding from Rico!"

Antoinette laughed as well. "If you want to put your mask on, then hurry," she told Erik, "for I am now going to look for our boy."

Erik fumbled with his mask and managed to get it back on, so that his face looked more or less normal again. Antoinette slipped out of the room to look for Rico and give the newly reunited couple some more privacy.

"That boy," Erik stammered, still confused. "He told me that he was living with his mother, grandmother and an aunt, but I would never have guessed that it would be the three of you."

Christine smiled. "We thought, since Mme. Giry had always been like a mother to me, that it would cause fewer problems if she passed for my mother as well. Foster mother, as it is, since I look nothing like her and Rita – Meg, that is. God, I would never have thought that I could get so used to her italianized name!"

Erik laughed. "That's something else I would never have figured out! Rico mentioned a zia Rita. How was I to guess that that was Meg? But of course, her given name is Marguerite, in Italian Margherita, hence the short form Rita."

Christine nodded. "Yes, and at the Opera she is known as Rita Giri. She is in the Corps de Ballet there as I am in the choir."

Erik smiled. "Yes, I can see now how Rico's description of his family could fit you three. But what about the boy?" he asked. "How does he fit in with the three of you?"

Christine stared at him in shock. Could he not guess? Was it not obvious that Rico was her son and if she was the boy's mother, then surely there could be no doubt as to who the father was and when exactly he had been conceived? Erik's next words explained the situation to her, though.

"He is incredibly advanced despite his young age. He must be around five years to judge from his height," her Angel said. "How and when did you find him?"

Christine grinned. She knew that her son was tall for his age, and it was therefore understandable that Erik misjudged the child's age. He apparently had therefore not figured out yet that Rico was his. What a wonderful surprise that would be for him!

"Wait till Rico is here," she told her love. "I want to tell both of you at the same time."

At that moment the door opened and the boy stormed in. "Mamma!" he screamed. "Nonna told me you are fine again and want to tell me something wonderful! Is it the music lessons? Did you give permission?"

Christine caught her son in her arms, then nudged him to face Erik. "Rico, my darling, will you please tell this gentleman your two given names and your date and year of birth?" she asked.

Rico looked first at her, then at Erik, and nodded. "My name is Erik Gustave," he told his friend, "and I was born on November 22, 1871. Can we start our music lessons now?"


	18. A Son

Once again, thank you all so much for your continued support! I love every single one of you, those who only read, those that put on alert, add to favorites and a special thanks goes to those that review! I also apologize for being a day late with the update. Real life got in the way...

Anyway, here is the second part of our family reunion, I hope you enjoy it!

And no, I still don' own anything or anybody...

Chapter 18 – A Son

Erik' eyes widened, as this information sank in and he began to grasp its significance. "Erik?" he whispered, "Gustave? And born in November 1871?"

Christine smiled. "Can you do the math?" she asked mischievously.

"Oh my God!" Erik exclaimed, shaken to the core by this revelation. "Am I mad or are you really telling me...?"

Christine nodded. "Yes," she confirmed, her eyes conveying all the love she felt for him.

"Christine! I had no idea!" Erik sank to his knees in front of her, his arms encircling her waist, and he buried his face in her belly – where their child had grown while he had still been recovering from his ordeal.

"Why are you calling mamma Christine?" Rico's fresh young voice brought Erik back to the situation at hand. "Her name is Katrina. Signora Katrina Almgren, but people call her Rina..."

Erik jumped back to his feet and scooped the boy – his son! - up in his arms. "I am afraid you are wrong, son," he said with a smile. Oh, how the word "son" rolled off his tongue! How heart-warming it was to know that this adorable, highly talented child was indeed his! He, the disfigured monster, had a son! And what a son! Rico was the most perfect and precious child any parent could wish for. What a wonderful gift his Christine had given him with this boy!

"I know for certain that your mother's name is Christine," Erik told Rico. "Mademoiselle Christine Daaé," he added a bit reluctantly. He suddenly realized how difficult it must have been for Christine to find herself pregnant while unmarried, how hard it must have been for her to think that her child would have no father.

Rico stared at Christine. "Why is this gentleman saying such things?" he asked. "What is the meaning of all this?"

Christine took her son from Erik's arms into her own. "It is the truth, darling," she told him. "My real name is Christine Daaé. I haven't told you yet, because I thought that maybe you were still a bit too young..."

Now it was Erik's turn to chime in. "Why Christine?" he asked. "Why did you change your name? Was it because...?" He gazed at the boy in her arms and half his face blushed in embarrassment as he realized what potentially detrimental consequences for her reputation their one brief night of passion must have had.

Christine nodded. "What else could I have done?" she asked. "With you presumed dead? I did not want to marry Raoul and make him think... I mean, I could not imagine myself with him in that way, not after you and I..." She blushed just as furiously as Erik had done a few moments ago. "I could not stay in Paris either, for if word had gotten out of my... condition, after my break-up with Raoul, everybody would have guessed about … us, and that could have put my child at risk. But even if I had gone elsewhere, rumors might have followed me, and people might have figured out, so I chose my mother's maiden name ..."

Erik sighed. "This is all my fault!" he exclaimed. "I should never have asked that of you that night. I should have waited till we were properly married! How could I get you in such a situation!"

Christine smiled at him. "We would not have Rico otherwise," she reminded him, putting down the boy and tousling his hair.. "And you could not foresee what happened. You were planning to come back to me the next night and to marry me. Everything would have been perfectly fine that way..."

Rico stared at them. "What are you talking about?" he asked. "I do not understand..."

Christine smiled at him. "We are talking about – us. The three of us. Rico, I should have told you right away, … this gentleman is my dear Angel Erik, after whom you have been named, your papa. He is not dead after all, and he finally found us again."

Rico's mouth fell wide open. "Is it true?" he asked Erik. "Are you really my papa?"

Erik grinned. "It would appear so," he admitted. "I am just as surprised as you. I had no idea I had a son. Your mother and I were separated long before you were born..."

Rico extended his arms to Erik, thus signaling that he wanted to be held by his father, who immediately complied, and beamed. "Since you are my papa, can you now teach me music? And all the other things fathers do with their children?" Rico asked eagerly. "And since you and mamma have found each other again, will I now get siblings too, like the other children?"

Christine once again blushed deeply, and, hugging his son to hide his embarrassment, Erik mumbled, "maybe, once your mother and I will be married..."

Rico's eyes widened. "You are not married?" he asked, "but mamma has her wedding dress in her closet, I saw it!"

Erik gazed at Christine. "You still keep that dress?" he asked.

She nodded. "Yes. It is a reminder of the happiest day of my life, when I finally realized how much I love you..." She giggled. "It still fits," she added meaningfully.

Erik knelt down in front of her. "If you will still have me," he said solemnly, "as I have reason to hope since you are still wearing my ring, Christine, I ask you once again, will you become my wife, the other half of my soul? So that we can both be whole again and our son can have a proper family as he deserves?"

Christine knelt down next to him and embraced him. "Of course, Angel," she said. "Of course I will marry you!"

Rico suddenly remembered something.. He looked at Erik. "Papa," he said, and Erik's heart almost burst with love at that name. "Papa, you told me once that the girl you wanted to marry disappeared. Was that my mamma?"

Erik nodded. "Yes, Rico, I was talking about your mother then. You see, I was not dead as she thought, but badly injured, unconscious. I could not go to her and tell her that it was all a false rumor, that I was alive. And she was so sad about my presumed death, that she did not want to stay in the place where we had been happy. She left, while I still was way too sick to contact her. But since she wanted to start a completely new life, in a new town, where nothing reminded her of the past, she told nobody where she was going, so I could not find her once I was well again. I thought I had lost her forever..."

Rico fought back tears. "That is very sad," he commented, shuddering at the thought that his parents might never have found each other again. Then he frowned. "But there was another girl with her, was there not? Your sister? Where is she now? Didn't you say, the two left together?"

Erik smiled. "My sister is here as well. My foster sister. Her name is Antoinette, and I believe you call her nonna."

Rico stared at his mother. "But nonna is your mother?" he asked her, overwhelmed by all the things he suddenly learned about his family.

Christine shook her head. "Not really. She has always been like a mother to me, though, just like she has always been a sister to Erik. She therefore is my foster mother and I call her "mamma", just like I consider Meg... your zia Rita... to be my sister."

"And grandpa Gustave after whom I am named?" Rico asked. "Was he nonna's husband?"

"No," Christine explained. "That was my own, dear papa, the violinist Gustave Daaé. He died when I was only seven years old. My mother had died at my birth, so I was completely alone. That's when your nonna took me under her wings and became my foster mother." She gazed at Erik. "And that's also when I met a certain Angel," she added lovingly.

Rico nodded. "Nonna introduced you?" he asked.

Erik and Christine both laughed. If things only had been that easy between them! "Not quite," Erik commented dryly.

And Christine added, "I did not know at first that my Erik was a real person. I thought him to be an angel, since my father had promised to send me the Angel of Music once he would be in heaven, to teach me to sing... and that's what Erik did, he taught me to sing!"

Rico beamed. "Me too, papa!" he begged. "Please teach me too!"

"I certainly will teach you all you want to know about music," Erik promised.

"Do you also know how to build hen-houses and such?" Rico inquired, eager to learn more about his new-found father.

Erik stared at him. "Hen-houses?" he asked befuddled. "Why would you want to build such a construction?"

"I don't know," Rico admitted, "it's just that the father of one of my friends built one recently, and it was great fun to watch him. Can you do things like that?"

Erik laughed. "Oh, so you want to know if I can compete with the fathers of your friends?" he asked. "I can assure you, that in this particular regard, I can. I have worked on several large buildings, both in Italy, where I learned from a great mason, and in... Persia..."

He remembered something. "I guess I should get going," he said reluctantly. "Nadir has probably arrived in the meantime and will wonder where I am..."

"Nadir?" Christine asked. "Your Persian friend is here with you? I want to see him and thank him for saving your life!"

"Nadir has been staying at an inn in Turin for the past few weeks," Erik explained. "Buying additional furniture, and a piano, but I asked him to come and join me today. I ..." he hesitated. "I wanted so much to get permission to teach Rico, but I was not sure his family would grant it. I could not know that it was you and Antoinette! And I did not want to be alone in case... Rico's relatives refused my offer because of..." He hinted at his mask. "You know..."

Christine smiled at him and caressed the visible part of his face. "Any parent refusing you to teach their child would not be acting in their child's best interest," she told him. "You are a great teacher, and I can think of nobody who knows more about music than you do."

Erik smiled. "I guess I am just lucky that the mother in question is so biased in my favor," he grinned. Then he added hesitantly, "you are aware that even once we are married, I will not be able to socialize and accompany you to events a lot, right? I mean, you will not be able to parade your husband around town..."

Christine embraced him. "If you don't want to, I won't ask that of you," she stated simply, "though I can assure you that nobody who is not specifically looking for it would notice..."

Rico stared at his parents again. What were they talking about now? Was there a problem he was not aware of? "What cannot be noticed?" he asked. "Why can papa not go out and meet other people?"

Erik winced, but Christine took his hand in both of hers and kissed his palm. "Rico has a right to know," she said softly. "He is your son."

Erik looked away. "But what if..?" he asked, scared at the thought that his son could turn from him in disgust if he knew the truth about his face.

Christine kissed his exposed cheek. "He is my son too," she said. "He will love you more because of it, just like I do."

"I already love Rico so much," Erik sobbed. "If he now shunned me because of..., oh Christine, you cannot ask that of me, if I lost our son's love, it would break my heart!"

"You won't!" Rico exclaimed. "Papa, I love you. I am so glad you are my papa, because nobody understands me like you, nobody else has melodies in their mind that want to escape. Whatever this is, I will always love you!"

"As you should," Christine chimed in. "You see, your papa had a very hard life because of a certain handicap he has. His own mother, your grandmother Madeleine, could not love him because of it, even when he was a tiny baby. She never kissed him, and she forced him to wear a mask to hide his... unusual... face. That's why we must love him even more to make it up to him."

"I am hideously ugly," Erik whispered dejectedly. "The right side of my face... it's a nightmare to look at, which is why it is always covered by a mask. Nobody should be exposed to such ugliness."

Christine hugged him. "I love your face," she told him, "and so does mamma Giry. It is part of you, and we love you. Rico will learn to love your face, too, my Angel. Give him a chance. Let him prove himself to you. He knows now what to expect, he is prepared. He won't turn from you, he has a kind, loving heart, just like his father..."

"But he is not even four years old!" Erik exclaimed. "God, he is even younger than I thought he was. I had estimated his age at about five!"

Christine nodded, "yes, he is tall for his age. Another feature he has inherited from you. And he is mature and understanding for his age. He will not be scared. Courage, my love, you will see, it won't be as bad as you fear, Rico will be accepting of you..."

Erik shuddered and closed his eyes in agony. He did not feel like he could do this. How could he bare his face in front of his young son? As mature as the boy seemed to be, he was still only over three years old, and having to look at a face like his might cause the child nightmares for years to come.

Suddenly Erik felt a tiny hand reach for his much larger one, and Rico's voice begged. "Please, papa," Rico said. "Please let me see it. I want to know what my papa looks like, and I do love you..."

Erik was shaken to the core. "Oh Christine," he sighed, "how can I do this?"

Christine snuggled up to him. "Trust our son," she whispered. "He knows that looks are not all that important, that it's a person's heart that counts. After all, he has been raised by me and mamma Giry. Do not worry so much, you will both be fine!"

Erik groaned. He still was not convinced this would go well, but he also knew he could not resist the combined pleas of Christine and his son. He nodded and resolutely reached for his mask, peeling it off his face again. His eyes closed, so that he wold not have to face the look of utter horror in his son's eyes that he was expecting, he turned towards Rico.

For a moment, Rico remained silent, studying the ruined side of his father's face, then he whispered, "oh my poor, poor papa! Your poor skin is so irritated from wearing this mask! I bet this is extremely uncomfortable!"

Erik slowly opened his eyes and looked at his son. Instead of the expected disgust, he saw nothing but concern in the child's eye. Erik fought back tears. Not in his wildest dreams had he expected the boy to react like this. "You... you do not find my face disgusting?" he asked.

Rico shook his head. "It is maybe a bit unusual," he said, "but it does not make a difference. I love you, papa. I have always wanted to meet you. It was just too sad not to have a father like all the other children do. I am so glad you are finally here with us. I am so happy that you are my papa, because I already liked you, when I did not know yet who you are. And isn't it wonderful that we now can have music lessons? And mamma won't cry anymore and will be happy again." He gripped Erik's hand and made him squat down next to him, in order to get a closer look at his father's face, then he hesitantly extended one hand towards Erik's disfigured cheek. "May I touch it?" he asked shyly, "or would that hurt you?"

Unable to speak, Erik simply nodded and moments later he felt his son's fingers gently caressing his marred flesh. He moaned, leaning into the boy's caress. This was the most exquisite pleasure he could imagine. He had a son, who was not only the most special little boy he had ever met, but also accepted him despite his face! The boy even dared touch the abomination that Erik always tried to hide under a mask!

Erik could not help himself. Tears streaming down his face, he picked Rico up in his arms and kissed his son's forehead. "You have no idea, how much it means to me, Rico, that you are not frightened by my appearance," he murmured. "I never expected to have a family. Then I won your mother's heart, but lost her soon afterwards, together with my dear Antoinette. I was so alone without them, even though I had my friend Nadir and his servant."

Holding the boy in his right arm, he extended his left arm to Christine and pulled her close. "And now I have not only found my Christine and my sister again, I find out I have a son as well, a wonderful little boy, I can be very proud of, and on top of it all, my son loves me and accepts my hideous face!"

Christine put her arms around her fiancé and her son. Her eyes were glistening as well, tears ready to fall. How often had she dreamed of such a reunion! To have found Erik again was already beyond her wildest dreams, but seeing him and Rico interact like that, sensing the love between father and son, was even better. "We are a true family now, my Angel," she whispered.

Erik kissed her. "How can I ever thank you, my love, for this wonderful gift? I have a family. A wife and a child – like any other man!"


	19. What now?

Thank you all for your lovely reviews, for reading, for putting on alert and for adding to favorites! Since some of you asked, yes, there will be another story soon, I am currently trying to figure it all out, that means, I have an idea how it starts, but need to think about the solution before I start writing, but there definitely will be another story!

As for our little family, there are some things to take into consideration before everything will work out fine for all of them, but they are getting there...

I still don't own anything or anybody... but I guess you know that by now.

Chapter 19 – And now?

After a while, Erik remembered Nadir. "I really should be going now," he told Christine and Rico. "Nadir will be wondering where I am and the good Daroga has a tendency to worry about me." He gave Christine a hopeful look. "Are you and Antoinette coming with me?"

Christine shook her head. "Not right away," she said. "We will let Nadir settle in a bit first. Also, we will have to wait for Meg to come home, so that we can tell her the news. She will be so surprised! But maybe we can visit later today? In the afternoon? I want to personally thank your friend for saving your life. Without him..." She blinked away tears. No, she did not want to dwell on that thought anymore. Her Angel was alive, they were together again and soon would be married and thus able to live together for the rest of their lives.

Erik nodded. "I will tell Nadir and Darius to expect you all at, let's say, three o'clock. I am sure that by then the furniture and the piano will all have been arranged and we will be ready for guests."

"The piano!" Rico squealed with delight. "I want to see it! We need it for our music lessons, right? Can I go with you right away and you show me the piano, papa?"

Christine shook her head. "I don't think so," she scolded her son. "You will only be in the way. You can inspect the piano later, when we all go over, and maybe your papa will play something for you..."

"He won't be in the way," Erik interrupted her. "I would love to take our son with me and introduce him to Nadir, and I promise I'll make sure that he does not get hurt by heavy furniture being moved." His eyes pleaded with Christine. "You have already lots of experience being a parent," he said. "I need to practice, and I want to make it up to Rico for all the years he had to live without his father..."

Christine smiled at her two Eriks. "In that case," she relented, "Rico may go with you. But make sure he eats something for lunch, a sandwich maybe..."

"Peaches!" Rico screamed. "Papa has a tree full of peaches in the garden! We brought you some!"

Erik pointed towards the basket he had safely put down at what seemed hours ago. "I thought, maybe I could try and bribe Rico's family with peaches to let me teach him," he said sheepishly.

Christine laughed. "You do not need to bribe us, Angel," she said, "but the peaches are welcome nevertheless. They are Rico's favorite fruit!"

Erik grinned. "I would never have guessed," he said cheekily, then added, "but I promise to feed him something more substantial than just peaches for lunch, though I guess there will be peaches for dessert." He took Christine in his arms and kissed her. "And I'll see you, Antoinette and Meg at three."

Christine nodded. "At three, my love!"

Erik turned to Rico, taking his son by the hand. "Come," he said, "let's go and see, if the piano has arrived!" Rico beamed and together, father and son left, taking the same way through the fields they had taken in the morning.

Christine followed them with her eyes till they disappeared behind some trees, then went back into the house. She found Mme. Giry in the kitchen and threw herself into her foster mother's arms. "Oh mamma," she sobbed, "I still can't believe it! I only know that I love him and that I'd die if I lost him again."

Mme. Giry had tears in her eyes as well. "It's a miracle," she whispered, "but I am so very glad our Erik is alive. I never realized just how much I missed that man until I saw him again today."

Christine hugged her. "He loves you, too," she told her foster mother. "He calls you his sister, and he missed us both terribly. By the way, I promised that we and Meg would visit him later today, at around three o'clock. Nadir arrived today and is probably right now unloading the furniture he purchased for them and arranging everything. I said we would go see Nadir and thank him for saving Erik's life."

Antoinette smiled. "I would love to do that," she admitted, then asked, "how did things go between him and our boy? I bet Erik had not expected to have a son!"

Christine giggled. "It took a while for him to figure it out," she explained. "He thought, Rico was about five years old and we had kind of adopted him, because of his talent, or something, but once he realized that Rico is his – and mine – he was overwhelmed. Rico was very pleased, too. It seems the two are already great friends. Rico went ahead with Erik, by the way, he wants to see the new piano – I guess, they both want to see it and Erik is itching to try it out."

Both women smiled. Then Mme. Giry turned serious again. "Did Erik say anything about... what happens now?" she asked.

Christine nodded. "We are getting married," she announced. "He asked me again, and of course I said yes."

Mme. Giry nodded, satisfied. "I guess, we'd better make sure that happens sooner rather than later," she commented dryly. "The way, you two were clinging to each other and kissing... This time, you get married, before … you know..."

Christine blushed. "We will," she promised, then hugged her foster mother again. "And thank you for supporting me those past four years and being there for me, although, in a way, I was a fallen girl."

Xxxx

Nadir and Darius arrived shortly after Erik and Rico had left together. They immediately began to unload the furniture from the rented cart, with the help of the driver and to bring it into the house. Two hours later, they were finished. Sweating profusely from the hard work, they looked around. "Where is Erik?" Nadir asked. "Surely it does not take that long to introduce himself to that boy's family and discuss music lessons with them? Shouldn't he have been back long ago?"

Darius frowned. "Maybe the mother was not home when he arrived there and he has to wait for her?" he suggested nervously. Nadir nodded absentmindedly. He was not really convinced, Erik would wait for somebody. Their "boy" was very uncomfortable around strangers and would not spend more time outside their home than absolutely necessary. He doubted that the new mask Darius had told him about, would have changed anything in that regard. Mask or no mask, Erik always considered himself an outsider, somebody at risk in the vicinity of other human beings.

The two old men were beginning to worry about their charge, when they heard laughter approaching. Two voices were clearly distinguishable, one was Erik's melodious tenor, the other one a fresh, young, child's voice. "Here we are," they heard Erik say, "I will first introduce you to my friends, then we can have a look at the new piano."

With that, Erik appeared at the garden entrance, a handsome little boy in toy. When Erik spotted Nadir, he scooped the boy up in his arms, tickling him to make him laugh and approached his friend. "Who do you think that is, Nadir?" he asked his friend, the giggling child wriggling happily in his arms.

Nadir smiled. "I would make an educated guess and say that this is the boy you want to teach, Rico, isn't it?"

Erik grinned. "This, my friend, is Erik Gustave Daaé," he said proudly, "my son."

"What?" Nadir was speechless. "Your son? Wait... did you say... Daaé?" Then it hit him. "Christine!" he exclaimed. "She is here? You found her again?"

Erik nodded. "I went to talk to Rico's family about music lessons, and imagine my surprise, when the mother in question was my Christine, and Antoinette is his nonna, her daughter Meg, who now goes by the italianized version of her name, Rita, is his aunt!"

Nadir gasped. "But the boy...," he mumbled. "I had no idea that you and Christine... I thought you had just ..."

Erik hung his head in shame. "I did not want to tell you that we... that is, I did not want you to think poorly of her, it was I that insisted... I needed that proof of her love..."

Nadir rolled his eyes. "I know you did not mean to, but you must have caused her some serious problems. I mean, being with child, and unable to get married, because the child's father is declared dead..."

Erik nodded contritely. "That's why they left Paris, and why she changed her name. She used her mother's maiden name and pretended to be widowed. That's why we never could find them. At least Antoinette was with her all the time and supported her and my child," he added.

"Ah, the good Mme. Giry," Nadir exclaimed. "You said, she and her daughter are here as well?"

Erik nodded. "And all three ladies will come and pay us a visit this afternoon, at around three." He glanced at Darius. "Do you think you can prepare some cake or something else a little festive? Christine and I renewed our engagement today and we want to celebrate..."

Darius beamed. "Congratulations, Master Erik," he mumbled, then pointed at Rico. "I must say, your son is a fine young man!"

Erik grinned. "I think so myself," he admitted.

Nadir turned to Rico as well. "I guess it's time for us to get acquainted," he said, "since you are our Erik's son."

Rico grabbed Nadir's hand and shook it enthusiastically. "Thank you," he whispered. "Papa told us that you saved his life and nursed him back to health after that accident that we thought had killed him. Thank you for saving my papa. I love him so much already. I am so glad he is still alive!"

Nadir smiled. Now that he finally had a good view of the child, he could see how much the boy resembled Erik. Their eyes were almost identical, as was the facial structure. The most notable difference between the two was the hair. Rico's chocolate brown, slightly wavy hair, definitely came from Christine's side of the family.

"I am glad, too," Nadir said. "I love your papa very much, and I am glad he survived his injuries, especially since it means that he could finally learn about your existence and meet you, my boy. It would have been a shame, if he had never known about you."

Rico nodded, then he remembered something. "Has the piano arrived?" he asked. "Papa said, you bought a piano and would bring it here today?"

Nadir grinned. "Like father, like son," he muttered, shaking his head. "It is obvious that he is yours, Erik, that boy is just as crazy about music as you are! I'll leave the two of you to your new piano, have fun!"

Xxxxv

At three o'clock the three ladies arrived. Darius had managed to prepare a peach-tart, which he served with coffee and tea. "We want to celebrate that our Master Erik has found his family again," he explained to the ladies, beaming.

Christine hugged both him and Nadir and thanked them both profusely for saving Erik's life. Nadir gave her an apologetic look. "It was probably wrong that we did not contact Mme. Giry right away," he told her. "But we had no idea... the boy... " he blushed. "And Erik's condition was critical for such a long time, he was in pretty bad shape, we really did not think ..."

Christine smiled at him. "I understand," she said. "The important thing is, that you were there for him and nursed him back to health."

Mme. Giry also assured Nadir, that she did not hold any grudges for not having been informed of Erik's survival four years ago. "All turned out well in the end," she said. "We are all finally together again, and we have to thank you for our Erik's life."

Meg stood aside. She had not really met Erik yet, but she knew that Christine loved him deeply and her mother also cared a lot for the disfigured man. She was therefore willing to offer him her friendship. Finally Erik spotted her. "Meg," he greeted her. "Your mother and I have been friends for years, she cared for me like an older sister, and your foster sister Christine is my fiancée and the mother of my son. I think it is time that we finally become friends as well."

Meg smiled. "I have heard so much about you, Erik, from both, Christine and my mother, and I can see that our boy Rico is already very fond of you. So – I guess we will have to get along as well, if we do not want to make them sad!"

Then they all sat down to savor Darius's delicious tart. After a while, Nadir addressed Erik and Christine. "I take it, the two of you will want to get married as soon as possible?" he asked. "Have you thought about how to do this?"

The couple stared at him. "How to do this?" Erik asked surprised. "I guess, one sets a date and makes an appointment with the mayor and the priest, and that's it."

Nadir shook his head. "I am not sure it will be that simple in your case," he retorted. "Especially, since you also want to acknowledge Rico as your son. Remember, everybody here thinks that Christine is your widow, that the two of you got married years ago, long before Rico's birth. If you marry her now... well, the truth would come out, and people would find out that Rico was born out of wedlock. Unless, that is, you want to pose as Christine's second husband, in which case you would have to court her for a suitable time and you could therefore not get married anytime soon. And Rico would only be your stepson, or if you want to give him your name, your adopted son."

Erik closed his eyes. "I had not thought of this at all yet," he admitted.

Nadir nodded. "I thought so," he commented. "There is also the additional problem, that Mademoiselle Christine is known under a different name here," he reminded Erik. "I assume you have documents under that name?" he addressed Christine.

Christine nodded. "Yes," she admitted. "Raoul got me those." She smiled at Erik reassuringly. "He does not know about Rico," she explained. "I just told him I wanted to start a new life, and since I did not want any male attention in this new life, since I was still mourning you, I asked him to get me documents as Mme. Almgren, widow of Erik Almgren."

She hesitated for a moment. "Rico's birth certificate, the only one he has, has therefore Almgren as his last name as well," she admitted.

Erik sighed. "I do not want to marry Katrina Almgren," he informed her, "but Christine Daaé. Do you at least still keep your original documents as well?"

Christine nodded. "Yes, but Rico's only valid document reads Almgren," she repeated.

Nadir laughed. "What a mess!" he commented. He looked at the ladies. "Did anyone see you come here?" he asked, and as they shook their heads, he thought for a while, then grinned. "I think I have the solution," he announced. Everybody looked at him expectantly.

"First," Nadir explained, "I think, we won't change the villagers' opinion that you have been married all along. Which means, the two of you need to get married at once, but some place else. Erik, I suggest, you leave immediately. Go find a tiny little village far away from here, preferably slightly outside Piemonte, where you two can get married and spend a few days of honeymoon, and which is far enough away from here that no word of your hasty wedding will ever reach this place. As soon as you have found a suitable place, let us know, and we will follow you there, first the ladies, then me and Darius, to avoid suspicion that we are all going together. You get married, then the ladies return home, we follow a few days later, and again another day or two later, we stage a meeting between you and Christine in the village square, where you recognize each other."

He turned to Christine. "I am afraid, to keep up appearances, you will have to keep wearing your widow's dresses until that moment, where you and Erik officially recognize each other as husband and wife," he told her.

Christine beamed. "And by then, it will be true, Erik will really be my husband..." She paused. "But what about my name? How will we explain to them that my husband calls me Christine and not Rina like everybody else? And how can we get Rico to officially bear Erik's last name?" She suddenly laughed. "It just occurred to me – I do not even know your last name, Angel!" she exclaimed.

Erik smiled. "It's Garroux. You will be Mme. Christine Garroux. As for that Almgren-business,... I don't know. Maybe we could say that since just before that accident I was involved in – whatever that was - we had been preparing you for a stage debut and we had chosen Katrina Almgren as your stage name and had therefore gotten you documents in that name? That you were so devastated by my supposed death that you wanted to start anew, to get away from everything that reminded you of your happy past with me, including my name, and that you therefore used your stage name? And if we explain the situation to the officials in the village where we will get married, surely they will be able to correct Rico's birth certificate and once I officially acknowledge him as my son and marry you, his last name should be officially changed to Garroux as well?"

Nadir nodded. "I think that way it might work," he said. Then he turned to Erik. "I am sorry, Erik, that this means you and Christine will have to separate again for a few days, but I think it's the best way to get out of this mess."

Erik and Christine looked at each other, their hands reaching for the other's hands. The thought of yet another separation, as short as it might be, did not appeal to them at all.

Nadir smiled. "Go for a walk in the lovely garden together," he suggested to the couple, "and discuss this. I know you want some time alone together. We will keep an eye on that fine young boy for you in the meantime, who is stuffing himself with peach-tart as if he had been starving for weeks," he added on a lighter note.

Erik and Christine smiled, and disappeared arm in arm into the large garden. Erik showed her the tree on which Rico had been sitting, when he first had seen his son, and Christine beamed when she heard that story. Then Erik turned to her. "Do you mind?" he asked, his eyes sad. "That I need to leave tonight and we won't be able to see each other for another few days?"

Christine sighed. "I guess we do not really have a choice," she said. "I will just keep in mind that we will soon be reunited forever, that we will be able to legalize our relationship and make sure Rico will never be considered a bastard, for I will be your wife, when you officially recognize me as your long-lost wife in a few weeks, and then nothing can separate us ever again." She smiled. "I will have to look forward to that, then I will be able to get through those next few weeks."

Erik smiled as well. "My brave Christine," he said, proudly. "And I will make sure to get you a few pretty dresses for our honeymoon. I take it you want to use your old wedding dress?"

Christine nodded. "Definitely," she confirmed. Then she looked at Erik in wonder. "It still seems all so unreal," she admitted. "I feel very much like the heroine in the opera we are currently performing, Il Trovatore. Leonora, too, believes her beloved Manrico to have died, but when she wants to take the veil, he arrives just in time, and she sings..." She faced Erik, then sang Leonora's lines from that scene. "Sei tu dal ciel disceso, o in ciel son io con te..." (Have you descended from Heaven or am I in Heaven with you)

Erik smiled. "Your voice has suffered," he commented, "you have cried too much. But we'll be able to bring you up to speed in no time, now that I can help you with it again." Then he turned more serious. "You know, I am not much of a believer, but I guess, Manrico's words from that scene do fit my situation as well." And he sang back to her. "Ma gli empi un Dio confonde, quel Dio soccorse a me!" (But a God confounds the impious ones, that God came to my aid).

Christine fell into his arms, and their lips met in an ardent kiss.


End file.
